Thibaut Pinot: I’m not at my best but I’m fighting at Tour de France

MENDE FRANCE JULY 16 Thibaut Pinot of France and Team Groupama FDJ competes during the 109th Tour de France 2022 Stage 14 a 1925km stage from SaintEtienne to Mende 1009m TDF2022 WorldTour on July 16 2022 in Mende France Photo by Alex BroadwayGetty Images
Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) on the chase during stage 14 of the Tour de France 2022 (Image credit: Getty Images Sport)

Thibaut Pinot on Saturday returned to the Tour de France stage podium for the first time since 2019, launching from the chase group on the final stages of the climb into Mende to underline French hopes that the rider who has faced a challenging period of injury recovery is now heading toward the Pyrenees with building form. 

Both Pinot and his Groupama-FDJ teammate Stefan Küng made it into the break of the day on stage 14, which started out with more than 20 riders but was split when at 50km to go Michael Matthews (BikeExchange-Jayco) charged off the front and then Andreas Kron (Lotto-Soudal), Felix Großschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Luis Leon Sanchez (Bahrain Victorious) joined him. 

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Simone Giuliani
Australia Editor

Simone is a degree-qualified journalist that has accumulated decades of wide-ranging experience while working across a variety of leading media organisations. She joined Cyclingnews as a Production Editor at the start of the 2021 season and has now moved into the role of Australia Editor. Previously she worked as a freelance writer, Australian Editor at Ella CyclingTips and as a correspondent for Reuters and Bloomberg. Cycling was initially purely a leisure pursuit for Simone, who started out as a business journalist, but in 2015 her career focus also shifted to the sport.