Alexis Guérin, Volta winner, backs Porto: “I saw 2004” | OneFootball

Alexis Guérin won the Volta a Portugal and headed to France after celebrating the triumph with Anicolor-Campicarn. At 34, the French cyclist is enjoying the greatest success of his career, nurturing a long-standing connection to FC Porto and already setting his sights on new goals in the peloton. Speaking about the victory he had been chasing, he said: “It was an honor to have managed to win it and I feel like I’m in a dream.”

It is a time for celebration and travel, but also for reflection for Alexis Guérin, who left Portugal to be with his son Liam from a previous marriage. Winning the Volta a Portugal brings to an end an obsession the Frenchman openly acknowledged and makes room for a personal wish off the road: to get to know more closely the club he has supported since 2004.

Asked about what it meant to win the Volta a Portugal, Guérin did not hide the emotional weight of a race that had been at the center of his preparation since the previous edition.

“Everything. Since last year’s Volta I had been completely focused on this year’s race. For me, winning meant something huge; it was the realization of a dream. It was an obsession, one of my main goals for 2026,” he said. “Winning the Volta a Portugal means winning the fourth biggest road cycling race in the world, after the Giro, the Vuelta and the Tour de France. As I said last year, for me the Volta a Portugal is like the Tour. It was an honor to have managed to win it and I feel like I’m in a dream.”

In the winner’s words, the Portuguese race carries the weight of a major crowning achievement, not just another victory on the calendar. The intensity of his preparation explains the sense of release of someone seeing a top-priority goal fulfilled.

The reception in Porto confirmed for him the popular dimension of the triumph and added a powerful image to the outcome of the race.

“Absolutely. I was impressed by how many people were there.”

The short reply conveys the impact of a celebration that lived up to the cyclist’s expectations. After the demands of the road, what remained was the memory of a shared celebration.

The conversation then turned to football and to a passion Guérin says comes from a family closely tied to the sport. The Frenchman explained his admiration for FC Porto and for Portuguese sport, rooting it in a European final he watched in 2004.

“I started cycling late; I come from a football family, so I have always been a football fan and also a fan of FC Porto and Portuguese football in general. I found they have an incredible training system. FC Porto are the great team of Portugal and I remember watching them beat Monaco in the 2004 Champions League final, with a great Ricardo Carvalho, along with Maniche, Deco and Alenichev,” he explained. “That was a great FC Porto team, but they always go far in the Champions League and are often the best team in the Portuguese league, in my opinion. It is a great club, the biggest in Portugal. They produce champions by winning every year. This country has an incredible sporting culture and achieves a lot without huge budgets.”

Guérin’s admiration blends memory, sporting culture and recognition of what he sees as a constant competitive ability. The reference to the 2004 team serves as the starting point of a connection that has endured beyond football.

Asked about the possibility of being invited to an FC Porto match, the Volta a Portugal winner made it clear that such an invitation would have special meaning.

“It would be more than special, it would be a dream.”

The wish retains the same simplicity with which he described his victory on the road: for Guérin, being close to the club would be another way of fulfilling a personal ambition.

As for his competitive future, the Frenchman is looking toward a Grand Tour and the possibility of winning again in Portugal, without hiding his ambition to add to his list of honors.

“-I would really like to win a stage in a Grand Tour. That would be my greatest crowning achievement,” he stressed. “But why not? What I hope is to repeat this victory in the Volta a Portugal. To put two Grandíssimas, maybe three, on my list of honors by the end of my career would be incredible. It would be wonderful.”

After achieving the greatest triumph of his career, Guérin does not see the Volta as an endpoint. The desire to repeat the feat coexists with the dream of winning a stage in a Grand Tour, in an ambition that makes clear the path he wants to keep following.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.