Falling is the biggest fear of all cyclists and yet more than a hundred of them had to face it during the legendary Liège-Bastogne-Liège race. The Belgian classic is always hotly contested and the riders try to position themselves as best they can in the peloton, which can lead to friction and cause crashes, as happened last Sunday. Among the runners most seriously affected are Julian Alaphilippethe 29-year-old sportsman, darling of the French public.
Caught in the collective fall, the companion of Marion Rousse found himself thrown below the road, against a tree. A fall of rare violence which resulted in several major physical glitches including two broken ribs, a fractured scapula and pneumothorax. Present at the time of the accident and first to rescue Julian Alaphilippe, Romain Bardet confided in The Team on these defining moments. “I see Julian, I see he’s really bad. He can barely breathe, he can’t speak, he can’t move. And there, I have a flash that gives me the impression of being the only one to see that he is there, that he is suffering and that the race continues without paying attention to it.he recalls.
It is an immense distress. I felt like he was gonna stay there, all alone, forever
A scene of chaos lasting a few minutes during which Romain Bardet feels alone and abandoned while Julian Alaphilippe agonizes by his side. “The motorcycles leave, the cars too and I’m there, in the ditch, I’m screaming alone in the void and no one hears me. It is an immense distress. I felt like he was going to stay there, all alone, forever.”remembers the husband of Amandine.
Out of danger, Julian Alaphilippe came close to the worst according to Romain Bardet. The two men like each other and were able to communicate after the accident. “He wrote to me on the night of Sunday to Monday, at two o’clock in the morning. When he got his phone back, that’s the first thing he did. We’ve known each other for a while. I hope he recovers quickly.”adds Romain Bardet, before concluding: “When I left the race after rescuing him, I only wanted one thing: to know how he was doing. I was afraid that he had an affected vertebra, paraplegia. I really feared the worst”.
Find the interview of Romain Bardet in full on the site of The Team.