Minutes after the 2023 Tour de France had completed its final high mountain stage at Markstein, on Saturday Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) gave an emotionally charged explanation as to why he had enjoyed its last kilometres so much.
"I was very pleased to be able to do that," Bernal told reporters. "Cycling fans are the best in the world, seeing the young kids on the side of the road who already know who we are, shouting out our names - that gives me a good feeling. That's why I love this sport and that's why I'm so happy to be here."
On Sunday, the 2019 Tour de France winner will ride onto the Champs Elysées an anonymous 36th overall, more than two hours and 30 minutes down on 2023 winner-in-waiting Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma).
But as Bernal said earlier this week, given the circumstances in which he is racing this July, in his first Grand Tour since his life-threatening training accident in January 2022, just to be able simply to make it to Paris constitutes a vital triumph in itself.
"When I started the Tour I had no expectations," he told reporters earlier this week. "I didn't give myself a specific goal because I knew anything could happen. But I think coming here was the best decision possible to take for my future.
"I'm happy to be able to finish it. This is the biggest, hardest race in the world, and the mere fact I can complete it is a victory.
"I was aware I hadn't had the ideal preparation, but this was the race I had to do to be sure to move ahead," Bernal told L'Équipe in an interview published on Sunday, with a big emphasis on the word 'the'.
"My team gave me the chance to do it, even though they knew I wasn't necessarily going to be competitive.
"I'm aware of that, but mentally I needed to come back to the Tour, too."
Bernal has fallen twice in this year's Tour, and he says that due to the considerable effects on his body of his major accident in January 2022, "every crash is painful and it makes me fear the worse each time.
"It's tough to go from being a Tour champion to just settling for following in the gruppetto. But I don't ask myself the question of if one day I can win the Tour again.
"I'm no longer in that state of mind. All that is no longer a priority once you realise it's just life that truly matters."
