This Sunday, Lenny Martinez eventually left Switzerland on a good note. The day after a real “bad day”, which cost him a good ranking overall, the young French climber bounced back in style on the closing climbing time trial of the Tour de Suisse. Over the 15.7 kilometers from Aigle to Villars-sur-Ollon, he showed all his abilities and obtained sixth place, among all the favorites. Joao Almeida won the stage, Adam Yates the overall.
Villars-sur-Ollon. It was again the destination on the Tour de Suisse today. In the aftermath of the queen stage around the Swiss city, the latter was also the finish of the final time trial of the race. A time trial mainly uphill from Aigle. “It was a nice time trial with a flat first part of 4.8 km,” explained Nicolas Boisson. “There was then a slight uphill section of 1500 metres, and then the climb they did yesterday, meaning nine kilometers at 8%. There were different possible strategies; to go 100% with the time trial bike, which we did with Sam and Stefan, in anticipation of the upcoming championships; three riders did it entirely on the road bike because they didn’t really have an objective; For Rudy and Lenny, the idea was not to lose too much time on the first part, with the time trial bike, then to make the change to finish with a lighter and more comfortable bike.” Starting at 3:09 p.m., Stefan Küng was logically unable to fight for victory. “We put him in a situation like it was a flat time trial, and that obviously penalized him,” said Nicolas. “We knew he wasn’t going to win anyway, so we might as well use that day to work towards the national championship and the Olympic Games.”
“At least I could have some fun to finish this Tour de Suisse”, Lenny Martinez
Lenny Martinez, on the other hand, made a sensation half an hour later. In the lead after seven kilometres of climbing, he then beat the best mark, held by Damiano Caruso, by almost a minute at the summit. The young Frenchman kept the “hot seat” for a while before he had to give it away to the race’s favourites. Five of them, including the first three overall, beat him. “I’m happy with my day,” said the young man. “I took a good pace and told myself that I was going to give it my all at the end. I felt like I had great legs, that’s nice. It’s weird, I felt good every other day this week. I don’t know how to explain it. The human body is sometimes strange. At least I could have some fun to finish this Tour de Suisse in style. Even if I’m a little disappointed with the overall result, I’m happy with my performance today.” “The idea was to remotivate him after yesterday, which was a very hard day,” added his coach, Nicolas Boisson. “The initial plan of this Tour de Suisse was to get close to the top-5 overall. He was fifth on Friday, and sixth today. I think that’s his real level, but we didn’t see the Lenny we all know on this Tour de Suisse. He has already performed very well since the start of the season, this is his first under-performance of the year. It happens, and we will work for it not to happen again.”
Despite his excellent performance on Sunday, Lenny Martinez was only able to move up to 32nd position overall, considering the amount of time lost on Saturday. “It’s been up and down,” confirmed Thierry. “Without his bad day, he could have done something nice in the overall, in line with his start to the season. His fifth place and his time trial remain great satisfactions. Apart from that, we saw Stefan get better every day, and that is the most important thing for the next goals. Sam also confirmed his skills in the prologue discipline, but it was a mixed Tour de Suisse overall.”
