Stefan Küng is a favorite in every pilot tournament, but his list of places of honor on the big dates has grown somewhat beyond today. And what makes it even more sour: The Swiss from Groupama-FDJ usually bite into the sand with (very) small margins.
“I have a feeling I’ve been cruising around this big win for a while,” Kong reacted after his silver medal in Australia, less than 3 seconds away from upsetting Tobias Voss.
“I’ve had a good season and some say I’ve improved in other areas and my trial time has gone down, but I was confident here.”
“I had a tough run because I contracted the virus after the Tour of Switzerland, but in the (second) European Championship I had a good feeling again and every training session I felt stronger and stronger.”
“So I wanted to race without regrets,” said the Swiss after the bizarre conclusion. “I thought I should knock Ganna, Evenepoel, Pogacar, and Bissegger, but of course I wasn’t thinking Foss. What can I say? Congratulations.”
Küng had the gold in the intermediate points, but was stunned by Foss in the latter part. And not the wind.
“The wind was completely extinguished in the last part. In the first part the wind was very present, in the last fifteen minutes it was not. And these winds helped you in the descending parts. You already noticed that I was slowing down.”
The gentle Swiss concluded, “That’s it, I thought I took the title this time. But I keep fighting. One day you will succeed.”
