Paris (AFP)
While he released a second book, "A last lap", the legend of the biathlon Martin Fourcade explained Wednesday in an interview with AFP feed "nostalgia" for his immense career, stopped last March , without feeling a "lack" of high competition.
Q: What prompted you to write this book?
A: "For my first book (+ My dream of gold and snow +, published in 2017, editor's note), I had already started writing on my own over the seasons. On the second, the person who helped me write the first one, Jean Issartel, told me in the fall of 2019 that it would be good to write a new one, in the form of a logbook, given the context in which I was, with a difficult previous season and maybe an end of career ahead. The idea scared me, because I am not very expansive, but I liked it. I wanted to take up this challenge and it was a great experience, a kind of therapy throughout the winter. I put on paper my doubts, my emotions when I found good feelings and it helped me to nourish my reflection about my end of career, to make my decision, to take a step back, to try to understand why I had done certain things, what had been my springs, my evolution as a member of the team of Fr
ance, the share I gave to my teammates ".
Q: Did writing this book help you make the decision to quit your career?
A: "My certainty was to make the decision at the end of last season. There were days when I saw myself leaving for 5 years and others where I wanted to stop immediately. It was a real help in this process and allowed me to mature my decision ".
Q: How is your post-career organized?
A: "There is not a second since I quit that I questioned this decision. Everything I am experiencing supports this choice. It is because I quit exactly at the time. where I felt I had to do it that I am appeased with that. I keep a sustained sporting activity on a daily basis, cycling, ski-wheels, running, I maintain my muscles, I want to go ski touring, alpine, cross-country. I vary the disciplines. I need this practice to exert myself and make a success of this transition as well as in my social bond since I have lived for 15 years through sport. From a family perspective, I also spend more time with my daughters after spending 220 days a year away from home. Professionally, I work with my partners who continue to support me and with Paris-2024 (of which he is the president of the athletes' commission, editor's note) in which I want to get more involved, to be more present on a daily basis to carry the project.
I am a real fan of the Games.
When they have changed your life as they have changed mine, you want to allow other people to experience this adventure, to adapt it to modern issues in terms of transparency and sustainable development.
We are at a turning point in the history of the Olympics ".
Q: You don't feel any lack of competition?
A: "There is nostalgia and cravings sometimes but no lack. I really feel like I have turned the page. I thought I would have this lack of adrenaline but no. From a sporting and competitive point of view, I have the impression of having passed this milestone ".
Q: How do you see the next Les Bleus biathlon season without you?
A: "I feel them well from a sporting point of view. I can feel Quentin Fillon-Maillet involved in his project, very motivated and ambitious. Emilien Jacquelin has made good progress. Antonin Guigonnat is also capable of coming back to interesting things and Fabien Claude is progressing. We have a strong French team. I am an amateur, a friend and, if they wish, with an outstretched hand. I am present and I communicate but they have found their place without me. I took a lot but they are no longer young people and they realized that time was passing and that their own time was now. Being too present and staying close to the management, that would have hampered their development ".
Interview by Keyvan NARAGHI
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