The day before Julian Alaphilippe won the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec on the Plains of Abraham, he was calm. He polished off multiple plate loads of pasta at the team hotel during lunch, and then fielded questions about racing, his team and its main sponsor, Tudor. The only moment of possible concern was the hunt for a post-lunch coffee as the buffet had run out of java.
Properly caffeinated, he reflected on his move to Tudor. “For me, it was a good moment of my career to join a project like Tudor Pro Cycling,” he said. “It’s really growing fast the last few years, but with a solid base and a big ambition. For me, it’s a really good feeling to keep my role as a leader, but also to help the young guys who come from the development team.”
When the conversation turned to watches, Alaphilippe mentioned that his favourite timepiece had actually made its way onto the wrist of the team’s press officer. Then, the Black Bay 54 was returned to the two-time world champion. The day before the Quebec City race, he owned four Tudor watches.
Lurking beneath Alaphilippe’s easy-going manner was a winless 2025. He showed good form at the Tour of Britain just before coming to Canada, but he hadn’t had a WorldTour level win since his victory on Stage 12 of last year’s Giro d’Italia.
That evening, Morgan Lamoisson, the team’s directeur sportif, revealed the squad’s plan for the Grand Prix race. “We have two riders for the finish, Julian and Marius Mayrhofer,” Lamoisson said. Mayrhofer had finished third in the Maryland Cycling Classic the previous weekend and was a solid alternative for the team in Quebec City. “We want to take responsibility and control the race,” Lamoisson added. “We’ll decide during the race if we want to make it hard. If Julian is feeling good, we’ll make the race harder. The goal for him is to take the corner at the bottom of the climb, about 1.8 km to go, in the top five.” The idea was to keep the pace high enough to shell out riders like Michael Matthews, who holds the record for the most wins in Quebec with three, and Biniam Girmay. The only danger: Tadej Pogačar also likes a hard race.
“Julian’s ready. We have a strong team, but we never know with cycling,” Lamoisson said.
Tudor did take up the pacing-making during the race. Yet, with six laps to go, Alaphilippe got into a move out of the bunch, but behind the…
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