“I don't have goosebumps like the first time” - Matteo Trentin reflects on his Tour de France memories and leadership at Tudor

Now 35 and riding with Tudor Pro Cycling Team, Matteo Trentin has seen the sport change around him, but his respect for the Tour de France remains as strong as ever. Speaking to Bici.Pro, the Italian veteran opened up about the scale of the race, the memories that have stuck with him, and his role in guiding younger riders into the chaos of a Grand Tour.

With stage wins at all three Grand Tours and a European Championship title from 2018, Trentin’s palmarès is extensive. But the Tour, he says, stands apart.

“It's the biggest race in the world and also the most important,” he said. “When, like me, you've had the luck and the skill to win stages in the three Grand Tours, you realize that the Tour is exponentially bigger, with more people than everything else.”

The global scope of the race still stands out to him. “It's something that immediately catches your eye. When you go to the press room for the conference, there are a lot of people. At the Giro and the Vuelta there are a lot of people, but not like this. And then they are different, they come from all over the world, while at the Giro and the Vuelta there are mostly Europeans.”

Trentin was just 23 when he won his first Tour stage. More than a decade later, the memory hasn’t faded. “I remember everything, because the roads and places I go to remain in my head. Just think that a few days ago with the Dauphiné we were in the hotel where I was the night before my victory, in Saint Amand Montrond.”

He recalled the chaos of the echelons on that day, which saw him lose contact with the front due to being on the wrong side of the split. “Cavendish had won, it had been the stage of the fans and he had panicked 120 kilometers from the finish to take out Kittel. Then the classification ones had come out and I remained outside the fan of Contador's Saxo Bank, to take out Froome. I arrived with him more than a minute behind, perhaps because I had placed myself at the back of the group, minding my own business.”

Trentin has watched the peloton shift in makeup over the years, with fewer veterans and more young riders than ever before. “The young people won back then too, maybe not as much as they do now. Especially because they let so many of them pass that now the group is only made up of kids and the old people have disappeared. In short, even by the law of large numbers, they are more than us.”

His third and most recent Tour stage win came in 2019, a victory that felt long overdue. “Let's say it was the last one available. I had come close to winning the stage on other occasions. In Colmar, in Saint Etienne and also in Bagneres de Bigorre in the Pyrenees, which was also tough. Simon Yates, who was my teammate at the time, tricked me a bit. I was in front in a breakaway alone and he was pulling behind. He came to get me, then he won the stage and... nothing.”

With years of racing in France under his belt, Trentin noted a recurring familiarity. “You realize that more or less the roads are always the same... many times you realize that you really pass through the same places. Or in any case, having to reach two points on the map in a certain region, most of the time you use the same road. It is also understandable, because by doing so maybe the organizers have less difficulty in asking for closures that they are not sure about.”

As part of a smaller team now, Trentin explained how his experience played a role in making the Tour shortlist. “When we made the plans, first there was the classics part, then I started to focus on the Tour. Coming from a slightly smaller team, where you still need experience in such big races and solid people who have maybe finished a couple of Grand Tours, it was a bit easier to become part of the possible candidates for the Tour.”

His ambitions haven’t changed. “The ambition is always to go for the stages, so you have to be ready to play them whenever the opportunity arises. But I don't have goosebumps like the first time, I know what to expect. It will be different perhaps for the young people in the team.”

He’s already offering advice to his younger teammates. “I don't know the names of all those who will be in France yet. But I can say that we did the Dauphiné and to those who had never raced it I said: ‘Guys, get ready, because here you will realize what cycling is. Here we really go fast!’”