Third in the Coppa Sabatini on Thursday, Romain Grégoire was hoping to make his mark this weekend on the Adriatic coast, at the Memorial Marco Pantani and the Trofeo Matteotti. Unfortunately, the French champion and his teammates first missed the right move on Saturday, before the young puncheur was not rewarded for his attack six kilometres from the finish on Sunday. He therefore had to “settle” for two top-15 finishes (13th and 11th), both in the sprint, during this weekend in Italy.
After three races in Tuscany, the Italian campaign of Groupama-FDJ United moved to Emilia-Romagna on Saturday. On the Adriatic coast, the Memorial Marco Pantani took the riders from Riccione to Cesenatico, with numerous climbs in the middle section of the race, followed by a completely flat final forty kilometres leading to the finish. Initially, Frédéric Guesdon’s riders opted to put someone in the breakaway, with Rémi Cavagna. “We wanted to have a guy up the road so that he could come over the final climbs at the front or in the peloton,” explained the sports director. “With a strong group, you never know what can happen, and the peloton can also play the waiting game in the back. The initial goal was for the breakaway to go a long way, not simply to be there for the sake of it. Unfortunately, it didn’t pay off.” As soon as the steeper climbs began around the halfway point, the six-man breakaway indeed fell apart, and Rémi Cavagna was unable to match the climbers in the group. “It was quite hard so it was difficult for Rémi to stay out front,” Frédéric added. “He was caught by the peloton, and unfortunately the breakaway didn’t help us.” What’s more, attacks started early in the peloton, and Groupama-FDJ United was unable to follow them.
“Romain really wanted to use his bullet at the end” – Frédéric Guesdon
“A lot of our guys weren’t feeling good, perhaps as a result of the rainy Coppa Sabatini, and Tom also suffered a crash,” Frédéric explained. “Romain quickly found himself on his own, and he wasn’t feeling particularly good either. He could simply follow the wheels. So we were in a waiting game, hoping to come over the final climb not too far behind the leaders and then rely on the sprinters’ teams to bring us back and fight for the win.” At the top of the final difficulty, the French champion was indeed part of a peloton of around fifty riders, but four men had managed to get away and succeeded in staying clear all the way to the finish. In the final, a group of five riders also anticipated the peloton sprint, meaning that Romain Grégoire could only fight for tenth place at the finish. In the end, he managed to take thirteenth. “Sometimes all it takes is one rider to get a result, and we believed in it right to the end, but given the circumstances of the race, it was difficult to have any real regrets,” Frédéric commented.
There was still one final round of the Italian campaign to contest on Sunday, in Abruzzo, and the team travelled nearly 300 kilometres south from the coast to take part in the Trofeo Matteotti. The course consisted of a hilly fifteen-kilometre circuit to be completed twelve times around Pescara. “It was quite a nervous and lively race,” Frédéric recounted. “We first put Soan [Ruesche] in the five-man breakaway, but unfortunately he punctured and was therefore dropped. Once the breakaway was caught halfway through the race, attacks were coming from everywhere, and we were always present, first with Lorenzo, then Brieuc, who followed several moves.” With fewer than two laps remaining, Romain Grégoire joined Brieuc Rolland at the front, but the peloton eventually regrouped behind a duo before entering the final lap, which included two one-kilometre climbs at 5%, as well as a 700-metre ascent at 6%. “Romain didn’t have extraordinary legs; he knew he only had one bullet and he really wanted to use it at the end,” Frédéric explained. “With the long finishing straight, teams that were still well organized, and the climbs not being very steep, it would have been suicidal to go from far out. We really had to wait for the right moment.”
“It didn’t go our way” – Frédéric Guesdon
For the French champion, the right moment turned out to be at the foot of the final climb of the course, less than seven kilometres from the finish. Launched by his teammates, he produced a powerful attack that only two riders were able to follow. “They went out hard, then the descent was fast and they were working well together,” Frédéric said. “We thought it could potentially stick, but the bunch came back together on the descent because it never really eased off. It could have worked, but things simply didn’t go our way.” At the bottom of the descent, the Groupama-FDJ United leader also closed a gap before Brieuc Rolland came forward to cover the attacks. Lorenzo Germani then moved him back to the front of the peloton after the flamme rouge, with the final sprint in sight. A sprint that he ultimately finished just outside the top 10, just as he had the previous day. “He found himself at the front a little too early, and given the efforts he had made beforehand, he understandably lacked the strength compared with the guys who had spent the whole time sitting in the wheels,” Frédéric concluded.
Groupama-FDJ United therefore ended its Italian week with a feeling of unfinished business. “With a little more luck and circumstances more in our favour, we could have done better, especially today,” Frédéric concluded. “There was clearly an opportunity to finish on the podium, or even to win. Romain’s crash in Larciano last Sunday still affected him somewhat throughout the week. At this level, the smallest setback can make a difference. It’s inevitably frustrating because we’re chasing results. I really think we deserved better because everyone is fully committed and we are often active in the races.”
