{"id":165713,"date":"2018-07-05T07:10:30","date_gmt":"2018-07-05T07:10:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=165713"},"modified":"2018-07-30T06:06:12","modified_gmt":"2018-07-30T06:06:12","slug":"a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/","title":{"rendered":"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor"},"content":{"rendered":"

I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced anaesthetist sounded relaxed and happy that his medical expertise hadn\u2019t been needed.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Neutral medical assistance<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Each race team of Le Tour de France has its own medical staff looking after the welfare of its riders, but its organisers, the Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), provide a neutral medical team to handle traumas. I asked Paul-Henri what he\u2019ll be doing come Le Tour?<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m the medical director of the Dauphin\u00e9, but in Le Tour de France I\u2019m second to [Dr] Florence Pommerie.\u201d So what do you do? \u201cDuring the race, we just follow the riders and if there is a crash\u2026\u201d you intervene? \u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Everything in its right place<\/strong><\/h2>\n

You\u2019d be forgiven for thinking that much of Le Tour is spent waiting for something to happen. Although traumatic crashes stick in the memory, they are thankfully rare. But that doesn\u2019t mean the medical team should be complacent \u2013 they need to be switched on to the race\u2019s tactical developments.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=rGp-s4zIDQw<\/p>\n

\u201cThe most difficult part of the job is to make a good position of each of the ambulances depending on the situation of the race.\u201d In other words, Paul-Henri is constantly balancing the need for his vehicles to be in the best position for any medical emergency \u2013 without disrupting the dynamics of the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe try to be at the best position\u2026 to have two vehicles per group.\u201d So, if you\u2019ve got a breakaway and the peloton are chasing, you\u2019re comfortable? \u201cYes\u201d, replies Paul-Henri, \u201cand we try to have as little distance between the peloton and the ambulance as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

The practicalities<\/strong><\/h2>\n

I ask what the difference is between the Dauphin\u00e9 and Le Tour. \u201cFor the Dauphin\u00e9 we have one main car and four ambulances, but for Le Tour we have two main cars, four ambulances, and one motorcycle.\u201d<\/p>\n

This motorcycle plays a critical role in reaching cyclists stranded in Hors Cat\u00e9gorie stages where larger vehicles struggle to climb quickly, and Richie Porte\u2019s 2017 crash into Chambery demonstrated the close relationship the ASO medics have with France\u2019s air ambulance service.<\/p>\n

Critical support<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Paul-Henri sounds so calm he could be talking about being aboard a Mavic neutral vehicle. But the reality is sobering \u2013 Paul-Henri was the attending medic at Michael Goolaert\u2019s tragic death in Paris-Roubaix earlier this year, so he\u2019s acutely aware of the risks that Tour cyclists take.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Manuele Mori receives medical assistance after falling during the ninth stage of the 2017 Tour de France.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I ask whether the neutral medical team are consulted by the ASO during the route planning stage. \u201cWe are involved before the Tour de France. We are involved in decisions for critical stages. We work all the year together [with ASO] and we know each other very well.\u201d I confess that I was shocked at the severity of Le Tour\u2019s 2018 route and ask if there any stages that cause Paul-Henri concern? \u201cNo, I don\u2019t think so\u2026\u201d and I can\u2019t help but think of Dr Pommerie\u2019s remark that she\u2019s always surprised by the peloton\u2019s \u201cresistance to pain\u2026 their will, and their kindness too\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Rider welfare is the priority<\/strong><\/h2>\n

I ask Paul-Henri about the relationship with the teams, which he says is \u201c\u2026 very good because we work together to do the best with the riders \u2013 our cooperation with the UCI and the anti-doping team is great as well. But we\u2019re here for the trauma, as we say en Francais, \u2018complimenter\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe go with the medical staff to talk with each other, if there are any problems with the riders, we\u2019re there at the disposition of the medical teams. But, fortunately, they do not often have to go to the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":165715,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[329],"tags":[2095,2096,845,2080,433,2064],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-165713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-video","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-cycling","tag-florence-pommerie","tag-jost-paul-henri","tag-tdf","tag-tdf-2018","tag-tour-de-france","tag-tour-de-france-2018","post_format-post-format-video"],"yoast_head":"\nA Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor - \u0160koda We Love Cycling<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-07-05T07:10:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-07-30T06:06:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"WeLoveCycling\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. watching time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/\",\"name\":\"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor - \u0160koda We Love Cycling\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-07-05T07:10:30+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-07-30T06:06:12+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"\"},\"description\":\"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp\",\"width\":900,\"height\":600},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/\",\"name\":\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\",\"description\":\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling magazine\",\"alternateName\":\"\u0160koda WLC\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/author\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor - \u0160koda We Love Cycling","description":"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor","og_description":"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced","og_url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/","og_site_name":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling","article_published_time":"2018-07-05T07:10:30+00:00","article_modified_time":"2018-07-30T06:06:12+00:00","og_image":[{"width":900,"height":600,"url":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp","type":"image\/webp"}],"twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"WeLoveCycling","Est. watching time":"6"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/","url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/","name":"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor - \u0160koda We Love Cycling","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp","datePublished":"2018-07-05T07:10:30+00:00","dateModified":"2018-07-30T06:06:12+00:00","author":{"@id":""},"description":"I caught up with Dr Jost Paul-Henri after Stage 6 of the Dauphin\u00e9. \u201cIt was a good day for us,\u201d he said \u2013 presumably meaning no crashes. The experienced","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp","contentUrl":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2018\/07\/profimedia-0292977810-1.webp","width":900,"height":600},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2018\/07\/05\/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-tour-de-france-doctor\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A Day in the Life of a Tour de France Doctor"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/","name":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling","description":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling magazine","alternateName":"\u0160koda WLC","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"","url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/author\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165713"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":165722,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165713\/revisions\/165722"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/165715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165713"},{"taxonomy":"global-categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/global-categories?post=165713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}