He swallowed the track and his opponents. Frenchman Benjamin Thomas won the world title in the points race on Friday at the Roubaix velodrome, the second gold medal for France since the start of the competitions. The 26-year-old cyclist, who had already won three gold medals at the Track Worlds in other events in previous years, won for the first time in this race, which is contested over the distance 160 laps (40 km ), interspersed with 16 sprints.
Thomas, unleashed, beat the Belgian Kenny De Ketele, very experienced (36 years old) but overwhelmed by the energy of his rival who took… eight sprints in a final transformed into a duel.
Returning to the level of the Belgian in the provisional classification 20 laps from the end, the Frenchman took the upper hand to finish to the delight of the public.
Locomotive of the French team
The last French medal in the points race (a non-Olympic event) dated from 2011, when Morgan Kneisky, Benjamin Thomas’ next partner on Sunday in the American, won bronze. The Groupama-FDJ team rider on the road, leaving for Cofidis, is the “locomotive” of French cycling in endurance events.
World champion of the omnium (2017 and 2020) and of the American (2017), he won the bronze medal of the American at the Tokyo Olympics, with Donavan Grondin, who on Thursday won the first medal of French gold in Roubaix, in the scratch.
Disappointed by his fourth place in the omnium at the Olympics, Thomas decided, in agreement with national coach Steven Henry, to temporarily turn his back on this demanding event to devote himself to other disciplines, in particular the points race. He thus won the European title at the beginning of October in Granges (Switzerland) before conquering world gold.
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