The Badger, the Professor and the teenager: France’s long wait for a Tour champion | William Fotheringham

The hype around Paul Seixas is fully justified as the 19-year-old bids to end four decades of French disappointment

When you write about the Tour de France for the best part of (deep breath) 40 years, the same themes recur, constantly evolving and mutating. The contorted fortunes of France’s finest cyclists have been a constant narrative since 4 July 1990, when the late Laurent Fignon put foot to tarmac in the feed zone somewhere in the bocage between Avranches and Rouen. It was cold, dank and wet, which given the canicule concerns gripping France at the moment seems like a bit of history in itself.

Fignon had started as one of the favourites, but that was the beginning of the end for “the Professor”. The search for a successor to the five-time winner Bernard Hinault had begun in 1986, the Badger’s retirement year when the ephemeral heir apparent was Jean-François Bernard; 1990 was when the doubts gained pace, intensifying with each passing year and with each potential champion who emerged, went under the spotlight, and eventually crumbled: Richard Virenque, Luc Leblanc, Laurent Jalabert, Romain Bardet, Warren Barguil, Thibaut Pinot.

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