CARCASSONNE, France — It is hard to know what is going on in the Tour de France, even if your job is to work on the Tour de France. The end of every stage includes a familiar ritual, with team employees and journalists gathering around phones and tablets, squinting into the harsh sunlight to try and figure out what the hell is happening. The team cars on the road are listening to race radio—which, as I learned yesterday, can be imprecise—or watching the race on their phones in the car; I have heard anecdotes about team car drivers getting info relayed to them by colleagues watching the broadcast from home. That information desert enfolds for the riders, too. This truth was most harshly embodied by former French darling Julian Alaphilippe on Stage 15 of the Tour de France.
The Tour de France's 15th stage was unremarkable. Everyone was tired from three big days in the Pyrenees, and with a rest day approaching before a Mont Ventoux summit finish, the stage was the most obvious breakaway day in the roadbook. Both Visma and UAE even had riders in the day's big break, as nobody had the energy to spend on chasing them through a hot day in Occitanie. UAE breakaway specialist Tim Wellens, free from a day of Tadej Pogacar duty, slipped away from a small group on a long stretch of rolling road 44 kilometers from the finish and soloed his way in to complete his trilogy of Grand Tour stage wins. Ninety seconds later, Victor Campenaerts crossed the line for second, and he was followed eight seconds later by a large group of breakaway survivors. Watching at the Intermarché bus, we joked about Astana doing a full lead-out to secure maximum UCI points for third, because while it's a result worth sprinting for, it's not one anyone will remember.
Well, they will certainly remember this one. Alaphilippe came around Wout van Aert to win the sprint and secure his place on the day's podium, and then threw his hands to the sky in celebration. It was obvious in that moment that he thought he had won the whole-ass race. Before we dwell on the psychic and physical damage that Alaphilippe sustained in this stage, let us consider what that win would have meant.
Alaphilippe made a big move this past offseason, trading the Patrick Lefevere anguish chamber for the chance to lead the upstart Tudor team. The Frenchman won multiple world championships at QuickStep and literalized the cliche about honoring the yellow jersey in 2019. But once he started crashing a lot and had a bad year and a half, Lefevere called Alaphilippe an overpaid bum and told him to get lost from what was at that point one of the best classics teams in the peloton. "Too much partying, too much alcohol." Lefevere said. "Julian is seriously under the influence of Marion Rousse. Maybe too much. Julian is a young dog full of energy, you have to let him cross the yard once in a while."
I saw Lefevere before the start of this stage. It's his first year away from Quickstep, though there he was, wandering around the paddock and greeting former riders. One of them, currently a directeur sportif with another team, said Lefevere was a tough boss, but fair. Lefevere's old team is about to lose double Olympic gold medal winner Remco Evenepoel to Red Bull, and one wonders about the long-term viability of the Quickstep project.
Alaphilippe went to Fabian Cancellara's Tudor and has yet to win a race there. He is 33, clearly in decline, and doesn’t really have much to do here at the Tour. His big moment was stealing one quarter of a fan’s cardboard sign that had, sadly, been written for a different rider. The French have not won a stage at this year’s Tour, and while that pain has been somewhat allayed by Kevin Vauquelin’s strong ride, the tradition of noble French losing has nevertheless been upheld. Alaphilippe clearly had the legs to win the sprint for the stage, and a win here would have all but capped off a great career. Imagine, the best French rider of his generation redeeming his nation's poor Tour, his own late-career swoon, and his fresh team all at once. Instead, he repeated history; Alaphilippe himself has lost in an even more painful way before, when he sat up and celebrated too early at Liege in 2020 and got pipped on the line.
After the race, we ran to the Tudor bus. A large group of French reporters was also there elbowing and jockeying, and I got shuffled into the French scrum. A disgusted Alaphilippe rode up, took his helmet off, and disappeared into the bus, muttering. When one of us asked why he celebrated, a soigneur joked, "He was happy, nice weather." Tudor racing CEO Raphael Meyer came out to face the music, first in French, then in English. He stressed that a crash earlier in the day left Alaphilippe with a broken radio, which meant his rider was flying blind into the finale, and while Campenaerts was not that far ahead of him and he was with Wellens a bit, he was also in the midst of an all-action bike race. Also, Alaphilippe was injured. "His shoulder was popping out," Meyer said, "so the race doctor put it back in."
Alaphilippe left in a van to get that shoulder checked out, without talking to us. The paddock was thronged with fans, reporters, and other riders trying to get back to their team vans. As a result, they had to go so slowly that fans started making noise and some journalists ran alongside, notably including a very intrepid Eurosport TV guy. After his X-ray, Alaphilippe gave a brief interview to some reporters, which I missed because I was chatting with someone at the Trek bus. "After [the crash] I kept pushing, because my legs felt good," Alaphilippe said. "Unfortunately the radio stopped working after the crash, so like an idiot, I went for the sprint trying to win. It's all about mindset." He did not sound happy. "Mentally," he went on, "I'm doing okay."
Despite the bad vibes at the bus, both Meyer and Alaphilippe stressed that the rider saw the "funny side" of things. That side is the only one that I see. There is quite simply nothing to be ashamed of here. The sting of hubris from his Liege loss isn't present this time around; all Alaphilippe did in Carcassonne was bleed and fight for a win he thought he'd earned. There was no presumption, just committed racing. What his incorrectly timed celebration shows, more than anything, is how tricky it can be for a rider to know what is actually happening in the race in which he is currently racing. Also, the clarity of emotion Alaphilippe raced with is the distinguishing trait that made him so fun to root for.
Later that night, I was riding a bikeshare bike home in the dark along a canal in Montpellier. I passed a group of lads who were delighted by me ringing the bell as I passed. They chanted "Ah, Alaphilippe, allez!" at me. It seems reasonable for everyone involved to take that as a compliment.
