Sébastien Hinault: " We have taken our responsibilities”
On the line
“Another crazy stage in this Tour du Limousin – Périgord – Nouvelle Aquitaine which has not been easy since the start. I would like to thank my team-mates once again for the work they did for me. It wasn’t easy with the Suc-au-May climb. We were a small group in front and then the guys rode perfectly so that I could keep my place in the overall classification. I think that tonight everyone in the peloton is a bit worn out, including myself. But tomorrow is the last stage of this beautiful event of the French calendar. We will try to do everything”.
“I have been in a breakaway twice. The first one was with Franck Bonnamour to make the bonus. I wasn’t riding, and I made the bonus to take the three seconds. This allowed Warren to keep his second place. He is now equal to Franck, but Warren is ahead of him in terms of places obtained in the Tour du Limousin. We never managed to take much time as many teams were riding, and finally we decided to get up together. I then went back in a breakaway but Pierre-Luc Périchon countered in the peloton and came back on us. This gave a nice impulse to the breakaway but as he was placed in the general classification, the teams that play this classification never let go. We were caught again. In the final, I put myself at Warren’s service because another breakaway had formed and it took time to virtually shake up the general classification. All the riders who were still in the peloton held on to the lead. Everything went back to normal and I am really happy to have contributed to keep the second place in the general classification of this Tour du Limousin-Périgord-Nouvelle Aquitaine. Personally, I left a lot of “rubber” (sic!) at the Polynormande, and it took me two days here to recover, but now I really feel good and it is a very good omen for tomorrow and the next races”.
“It was one of the hardest Tours du Limousin I had to race, and this on two levels: in terms of altitude difference, and because of the rhythm of the race. We had to keep Warren warm and avoid the bonus game. Romain was first in front of Franck Bonnamour who gained two seconds. Warren and Franck are ex-aequo in time, but Warren remains second in the total of the places. On a stage like this it is the legs that speak. We all did our best to help Warren by doing our share of the work. As they say, alone we go fast, together we go far…”.
The debrief
“A real Correzian day! On paper we thought that the beginning of the race would be more difficult than the end, and indeed it wasn’t easy, but we realised that the end of the stage wasn’t as easy as that, with very small gradients and always in the grip. It is a very disjointed race, difficult to read, and above all, the riders are always on the offensive and are never far away in the general classification, at about one minute and who go into the break with the hope to win the stage and gain places in the general classification. This forces them to ride constantly behind. We saw that the Ag2r-Citroën team didn’t have too many riders left to do this work for Dorian Godon and that they had to let him go at a certain moment. So we took our responsibilities to protect Warren’s second place in the overall classification and assumed our position. We are keeping second place, Dorian Godon is very strong. We’re second tonight with Warren, but maybe we’ll settle for that and do everything we can to try and win him one”.