Rose-Marie and Cinzia, the hitchhikers of “Beijing Express: The route of 3 continents” – Patrick ROBERT / M6
- M6 broadcast, this Tuesday evening, the last episode of the fourteenth edition of Beijing Express.
- At the end of a final tighter than ever, Christophe and Claire arrived before Rose-Marie and Cinzia and won 58,730 euros.
- “There is a kind of relief when you arrive. We are obviously sad to lose, but on the other hand, it was so intense that we say to ourselves that we have finally arrived at the end ”, express the two Parisians facing 20 minutes.
At the end of their rope and breathless, Rose-Marie and Cinzia did their utmost to secure the victory of the fourteenth season of Beijing Express. Despite everything, Christophe and Claire were stronger than them. Six months after the end of filming, the two Parisians do not look at their adventure with a bitter taste in the mouth and evoke the final as if they were still there. And they say it: despite their many physiotherapy sessions and the days they had to spend bedridden to recover from their emotions, they are ready to prepare their red bag again for an all-star season.
We suspected from the start that it would be a very close final and you prove it by crossing Christophe and Claire …
Cinzia: We were aware of their position, which I think was not the case for them. We knew it was super tight. At the end, the last car we take tells us that a buddy was looking for a car here. It is not clear if they have already left or if they are still looking. There, we have some doubts and we say to ourselves that it is possible that they will be in front of us for the final sprint. But maybe their car took the wrong road, you never know, so we don’t give up until the end.
As you start the final sprint on foot, do you feel like it’s over for you or do you totally believe in it?
Rose mary : We suspected but we still told ourselves that in order to have no regrets, we would not let go.
Cinzia: We run this final sprint in pain and in tears. I am ultra-injured and in pain. We know that in Beijing Express, nothing is ever finished. And until the end, we did not let go, even if we had this knowledge of the position of the father and the daughter. As long as we don’t see them, as long as we haven’t arrived, we won’t let go.
By the time you arrive on the red carpet, Cinzia is still smiling and Rose-Marie bursts into tears… Is the pressure coming down?
Rose mary : Throughout this final, Cinzia is in pain. Me, I also have many wounds but which are not necessarily visible. I take the top, I carry her and I even pull on the rope because I see that she is crying, that she wants to walk. We have to try everything for everything so as not to regret anything. When we arrive on the red carpet … [Elle s’arrête] Oh my god, I have the emotion that comes back there! When we walk up to the red carpet and I see them, I tell her I’m too proud of her. [Elle s’arrête à nouveau] There we are crying [rires]. I’m so proud of everything we’ve been through with all the injuries we have at that time. Me, the catapult… When I woke up on the day of the final, I couldn’t move my neck. The wounds are not visible, I gain the upper hand as Cinzia’s pain increased.
Cinzia: There is a kind of relief when you arrive. We are obviously sad to lose, but on the other hand, it was so intense that we think we have finally come to the end. In addition, we know that we narrowly failed because despite the injuries, we got to eight minutes, not even. You have to know how to lose with panache and they deserved this victory and we would have deserved it just as much so it was really a great final full of uncertainty, nobody knew who was going to win.
Looks like you’ve rarely struggled to find cars while hitchhiking. Was that actually one of your strengths?
Cinzia: Not at all. [Elles explosent de rire.] We also struggled. I think that hitchhiking was even much easier for Claire and Christophe because a father and his daughter are immediately touching, it gives you confidence. We also had it easy at times, but generally speaking, we struggled.
Rose mary : Quite frankly, we never saw hitchhiking as a force. I didn’t find that we were super efficient in hitchhiking.
The race was stopped in the middle of filming because of the Covid-19. Do you think the break served you or wasted?
Rose mary : When we leave Uganda, we have just had two final duels, we came back together and ready to go to the final. We dreaded the second start because we thought the dice were going to be re-rolled. People who were weakened were going to pick up the hair of the beast. We start again from zero but we see that our mind takes over quickly.
Cinzia: If we had continued on Ethiopia, we were clearly in a dynamic that would have led us to the final. Many pairs were weakened by the end of Uganda. We lived two Beijing Express in fact, and given the state in which we arrive in the final, I don’t know how we would have done if we had had to accumulate the ten episodes. Physically, it was hot.
What most vivid memory do you keep in mind?
Rose mary : For the emotion that it puts in me every time I talk about it, I think it’s the moment when we arrive on the red carpet and I tell Cinzia that we can stop running and that we release the pressure.
Cinzia: It is the accomplishment of our whole adventure, it is the most intense moment. During all the episodes, we surpass ourselves, we face our weaknesses, we discover strengths. And above all, we have the chance to be there for each other. When you arrive on this red carpet, it’s really the accomplishment. Our victory is also there, despite the fact that we did not win Beijing Express, we still won.