Julian Alaphilippe says if he could only choose one more race to win it would be the Tour de France
The world champion said, hypothetically, he would want to win the Tour de France if he only had one more win in him
Julian Alaphilippe has said that if he could only win one more race in his career it would be the Tour de France, but was keen to point out he doesn't want to target the French Grand Tour in 2021.
Alaphilippe (Deceuninck - Quick-Step) said he had targeted the World Championships above all else, and now he has rainbow stripes on his jersey he can broaden his horizons.
When asked what race he would most love to win on Eurosport France's Bistrot Vélo, the world champion said: "Now after winning the World Championships, for sure I’d really like to win the Tour de France."
"The two races that always made me dream were the World Championships and the Tour de France. Of course, I want to win Monuments and Classics but if I could only pick one, it would be the Tour. "
But Alaphilippe went to great length to say he was just answering the questions and not declaring that he would be targeting the Tour.
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"I didn’t say I am going to win it. I just said that if I could only choose one race to win, that would be it," continued the Frenchman.
With Alaphilippe finishing fifth in the 2019 Tour, after leading for most of the race only to lose out to Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) in the last few days, the media were expecting something similar for 2020.
Alaphilippe did start well, taking stage two and the yellow jersey before losing it through a penalty to Adam Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) and eventually finishing 36th in the general classification after multiple breakaway displays.
"The route of the 2021 Tour is nice, and it motivates me," Alaphilippe added, "with the opening stages that suit me quite well."
"But for the moment, I’m only thinking about preparing for the start of the season and the Tour always comes a bit afterwards," he said, as he looks to aim for a return to the Tour of Flanders after a superb display was cut short in 2020 due to him crashing into a motorbike.
Alaphilippe made his first appearances at the cobbled Classics in 2020 with some excellent displays, especially at Flanders and Brabantse Pijl, winning the latter by a hairs width of Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin Fenix) who timed his sprint poorly.
When asked about whether he and young Belgian team mate, Remco Evenepoel, were in competition in Grand Tours, Alaphilippe was swift to deny it and said: "We’re not in competition. On the contrary, I’m very happy when he wins races and it’s the same for him,
"We’ve already done races where he’s ridden for me or where I’ve given him a hand, and it’s worked very well like that."
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Hi, I'm one of Cycling Weekly's content writers for the web team responsible for writing stories on racing, tech, updating evergreen pages as well as the weekly email newsletter. Proud Yorkshireman from the UK's answer to Flanders, Calderdale, go check out the cobbled climbs!
I started watching cycling back in 2010, before all the hype around London 2012 and Bradley Wiggins at the Tour de France. In fact, it was Alberto Contador and Andy Schleck's battle in the fog up the Tourmalet on stage 17 of the Tour de France.
It took me a few more years to get into the journalism side of things, but I had a good idea I wanted to get into cycling journalism by the end of year nine at school and started doing voluntary work soon after. This got me a chance to go to the London Six Days, Tour de Yorkshire and the Tour of Britain to name a few before eventually joining Eurosport's online team while I was at uni, where I studied journalism. Eurosport gave me the opportunity to work at the world championships in Harrogate back in the awful weather.
After various bar jobs, I managed to get my way into Cycling Weekly in late February of 2020 where I mostly write about racing and everything around that as it's what I specialise in but don't be surprised to see my name on other news stories.
When not writing stories for the site, I don't really switch off my cycling side as I watch every race that is televised as well as being a rider myself and a regular user of the game Pro Cycling Manager. Maybe too regular.
My bike is a well used Specialized Tarmac SL4 when out on my local roads back in West Yorkshire as well as in northern Hampshire with the hills and mountains being my preferred terrain.
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