“Winning a stage in the Tour de France is everybody’s dream. I’m not a neopro and I’ve been dreaming of this for a very long time. The period after the Classics was very difficult for me. I had a verbal agreement with the team about extending my contract, but I got ignored for a long time. I was at a long altitude training camp. My girlfriend was there and she supported me every day, while pregnant, as I was struggling to even fulfil my training program. I doubted I had a future in cycling as I was about to become a father. Coming into the Tour de France we had a super motivated team, with a super good atmosphere in the team. This is just the sum of the atmosphere in the team and we’re gonna celebrate tonight. The support I’ve had from my girlfriend is incredible, she is always there for me. She is my girlfriend, not my wife. Not yet! We have been nine weeks in altitude together, at Sierra Nevada (Spain). She gave birth to our son in Granada, indeed, at the bottom of the climb. She is the hero of this story. I’m so grateful to her and to the team, which showed a lot of faith in me and allowed me to stay for nine weeks in altitude without doing any race on the build-up. I’ll be leaving the team this winter, but I’m happy I can finish my spell in the team with the highlight of my career. I think I played it very smart and also the team gave me a lot of confidence. Everybody knew that I had very good legs and that this was a stage that I aimed for in December already. I knew this was the only stage that looked like I could win. In the breakaway, I only had one bullet and maybe played it a bit dirty, showing everybody that I was hurting a lot in order not to take many pulls. The final attack was great, and the trio at the front cooperated super well today. I’m lost for words. I’m looking forward to see my girlfriend and my son.”
