'It's crazy' - Disbelief for Tronchon after shock Vuelta win

Wout van Aert (Visma Lease a Bike) was the logical favourite, but the finale proved a chaotic one, and Xabier Azparren (Pinarello-Q36.5) and Yevgeniy Fedorov (XDS-Astana) looked set to carry off the spoils when they ghosted off the front in the last kilometre.

But after a fine lead-out from Groupama-FDJ teammate Guillaume Martin, Tronchon produced a devastating finishing sprint to claim an emphatic win from Magnus Cort (Uno-X Mobility) and Thibau Nys (Lidl-Trek).

Amid the tumult of the finale, Tronchon admitted that he wasn’t entirely certain that he had been sprinting for first place.

“I finished on the line, but I wasn’t sure if there were some guys in front or not so I did not put my hands in the air,” Tronchon said. “But it’s crazy, I can't believe it. The last few days were really hard for me, but today I was good. I said to Guillaume, ‘Go full gas until you die,’ and now I take the win. It’s crazy.”

A native of Chambéry, Tronchon is in his fourth full season as a professional and his first with Groupama-FDJ after starting his career with AG2R. This is his third Grand Tour appearance after outings at the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France in the previous two seasons, but he was not sure of his form coming into the race.

“No, really not, because the preparation this year wasn’t really good,” Tronchon said. “I didn’t feel good last week. It was a bit strange, not like the other years, but I was like, ‘Trust the process, and we’ll see.’ When I took the start, I said, ‘OK, the job is done, so now I just need race the way I like and go forward.”

Tronchon made little impact in the opening week of the race, though there was a glimmer of form when he sprinted to seventh in Xeraco on stage 8. The 24-year-old carved out an opportunity for himself as the Vuelta resumed after its first rest day, and his finishing speed carried him to a fine victory.

It was Tronchon’s first win since he claimed Tro-Bro Léon last year. His maiden pro victory, meanwhile, had come on Spanish roads, when he sprang a surprise as a stagiaire on the 2022 Vuelta a Burgos, beating Pavel Sivakov in a two-up sprint in Villarcayo. 

“Spain suits me well,” Tronchon said. “To be honest, all today I was saying to myself the roads are super and I had a sore neck from looking up so much because the landscape was so beautiful. I was loving it all day and that’s how I won.”