“I have high expectations and we’ll see how it goes,” founder Antoine Cyr told Sportcom on Saturday about the classic 20km mass start of the World Championships in Les Rousses, France. It is clear that the resident of Gatineau filled them, he who finished eighth on Sunday.
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“I was hoping for a solid top 20 or top 15 but it’s great to get another top 10 like this in the season! It was a really tough course,” Cyr commented in an interview after his doping test.
The 24-year-old athlete finished fourth in the 15-kilometer classic mass start of the recent Tour de Ski on January 7.
Denying France’s Richard Jouve the sprint win on Saturday, Norwegian and World Cup leader Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo beat classic-style specialists Finland’s Iivo Niskanen (+1.2s) and Sweden’s William Poromaa (+1.3s). s). Cyr was 38.4 seconds behind the four-time Beijing Games medalist.
“Today (Sunday) I went into the event with no pressure and with the thought of having a good race and doing my job, which I train for several months a year. It made me happy and it was such a fun race in front of a crowd and I repeat it was amazing! It was crazy ! I’m really very happy!”
The Quebecer was 20th in the early splits as he began his climb to the front of the group. Eighth after the seven-kilometer mark, he held his own in these waters to the finish.
“After two laps it started to get elastic in the back so I snuck in to go up front. I did it at the right time when the race started to explode with the intermediate sprint.
The Olympian, present in the World Cup since his debut at the Ski Tour of Canada in March 2019, now knows how to read the races perfectly to position himself well in the group but without going into the red waiting for the last to guess kilometers.
With just under 5 kilometers to go, the gap that separated him from the front surpassed the 10 second mark, only for him to still be able to defend his eighth place.
Antoine Cyr will travel to Livigno, Italy, to attend a World Cup preparation course.