Moto GP: a French double that enters the Pantheon of sport

A French double at the Moto GP Doha Grand Prix this Sunday evening.

Fabio Quartararo winner in front of Johan Zarco new world championship leader.

For Virginie Phulpin, the images of this podium enter the pantheon of French sport. 

First of all, there is this happiness of the moment.

Communicative smiles, a Marseillaise that we catch ourselves singing gaily, a joy shared between the two heroes of the day, those eyes that shine with pride and emotion and those laughs that eat up our faces and make us forget the masks over time. for a moment.

It was a moment of weightlessness that we experienced this Sunday evening, after a crazy race where we saw Fabio Quartararo stuck in 9th place, before seeing him climb irresistibly to the outposts.

He erased his opponents as on parade.

Class, determination and that hint of modesty that makes the moment even more touching.

Is this your greatest victory?

“At the same time, I haven't won a lot, big prizes,” he replies with a big smile.

How do you want to resist this?

The pilot takes us on his journey.

At 21, he already won last year at the start of the season, and everything was packed, he was compared to the myth of the Valentino Rossi motorcycle, before he ended the year 2020 on a series of chess.

A little heavy to carry, all that.

And yet, there, he returned to the front of the stage with incredible lightness, a tender bond with the other Frenchman, Johan Zarco, the new leader of the world championship.

The two pilots offered us a necessary breath of fresh air between the egg hunt and the start of a new confinement.  

There is the happiness of the moment, but also a real place in the history of French sport 

We have to go back to 1954 to find traces of a French double in the premier category of motorcycles.

At the time of a harsh French winter and the call of Abbé Pierre for the most disadvantaged, at the time of the battle of Dien Bien Phu in Indochina.

Fabio Quartararo and Johan Zarco make us revise our history lessons.

In sport, we tend to use the qualifier "historical" incorrectly.

But there, clearly, it has its place.

The Doha Grand Prix will remain in our memories.

In addition, motorcycles are not necessarily the most popular sport in France, if we compare with Italy or Spain for example.

And there, we have two pilots who make resound the Marseillaise and make us recover to the soft sounds of France which wins.

They will bring many people to take an interest in this discipline, to discover it.

It is not a masterstroke that they achieved this Sunday, it is a double masterstroke.

So thank you gentlemen, and look forward to the next grand prize!