Stage winner Simmons talked to team car mid-attack: "I asked if I could drop back, I was wo demoralized"

“Honestly, I actually wanted to win yesterday,” Simmons admitted in the flash interview after the stage. “I was highly motivated, in honor of Gino (Mäder, ed.). I wanted to win for him.” Mäder died two years ago in the Tour de Suisse, motivating Simmons to win a stage for Mäder. “It's tough for me to be here again, especially because I saw his mother at the start. Now I can pay a small tribute, and I had extra motivation today.”

Simmons had already set his sights on the second stage. In that stage, he finished fourth, behind stage winner Albanese (EF Education-EasyPost). Simmons was in a good position heading into the final hundreds of meters of that stage but saw three riders, including Albanese, pass him. The next day, he tried his luck from afar by joining the early breakaway.

From that position, Simmons managed to secure his second victory of the season after the 24-year-old rider had already won the sixth stage of the Tour of Catalonia, which was only 25 kilometers long, and the US cycling championship. “Today, I had extra motivation and a little frustration,” he said, referring to the previous day.

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So Simmons was in the breakaway of the day right from the start. The peloton denied the leading group any space, which meant that Simmons had little confidence that things would end well. "There was even a point when I asked the car if I could drop back. I was so demoralized. We only had a minute and twenty seconds, and I thought, This is a stupid thing to be doing. But we stayed in the race, and I got full motivation from the team car. It's so difficult to win a cycling race, so you can't let an opportunity like this slip away."

Even after his final attack twenty kilometers from the finish, Simmons still wasn't confident he would win. “Honestly, I didn't believe it until the last two or three kilometers. Of course, I would go all out to see if I could make it. But I heard from behind that they were starting to believe in me, that the group was slowing down.”

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Simmons' WorldTour victory is a unique achievement for the young rider: it is his first victory in the championship jersey of his home country, the United States. “The last time I wore this jersey, I had a terrible year afterward due to injury.” In 2023, Simmons also became his country's national champion, just like this year, when the rider won his second national title solo at the end of May.

There is another fact that makes the victory in Switzerland even more special. "It's special anyway that someone has won in this jersey. I can't remember anyone winning such a big race in this jersey. My dream was to win a race in this jersey this year. To do that on my third day of racing (after the national title race in the US, ed.) is very nice.“

Of course, the question was asked whether we will see Simmons back in his champion's jersey in the upcoming Tour de France. ”I've done my part with this victory. Now it's up to the team to decide," said a satisfied man.