You’re a project leader for BtoT and an athlete with a mind of steel: how to you reconcile these two aspects of your life?

Ever since childhood, I was pushed to practice sport by my parents. I practiced running, tennis, judo, fencing, swimming, mountain biking, road biking, triathlons… I even did road cycling to quite a high level during my teens, but faced with a choice of a sports career or traditional studies, I opted for studies. Today, I work in the métier BtoT on the development of our Airports activities. But I haven’t given up sport, far from it! Practicing sport still plays a central role in my life and provides a structure for my daily life. It’s not always easy to reconcile work and sport. Planning an Ironman*, for example, requires you to juggle with your professional agenda, and business travel in particular. Time for training also needs to be scheduled in… This organisation is paramount.

So you’re an “Iron Man” (Editor’s Note: name given to athletes participating in the Ironman competitions). Can you tell us more about your experience of this competition and the training it requires?

I took part in an Ironman in South Africa last April. 3.8 km of swimming, 180 km of cycling, 42 km of running, all in 10 hours 51 minutes. It was my first experience over this distance and it stirred up quite a few emotions. The landscape, the atmosphere, the spirit of the race, shared by more than 2,000 participants and 50 different nationalities… For this particular Ironman, I trained between 10 and 13 hours per week. That may sound a lot, but for a competition of this kind it’s relatively little. In the training phase, my typical day starts at 7am: I’ll swim for a good hour before going to work, then l’ll go for a run at either 2pm or 9pm. Most importantly, you need to manage permanent recovery. My next goal is to run the marathon in less than two and a half hours in April and to do another Ironman in October 2018 in Malaysia, reducing my time by one hour. A one-year project.

So you’re more of a solitary sportsman. Does that serve you in your professional missions?

Solitude is something I need during my workouts, and it doesn’t scare me. I often seek it out. I trained for 5 months all alone, all winter, and I liked it. I remember a solitary five-and-a-half hour 150 km bike ride in early March, completely in the rain in the Chevreuse Valley… On the way back home, I felt like I’d done something with my day! In my work, we deal with fairly long projects that require you to remain focused on the long term, without seeing any immediate benefit. You have to get used to it and persevere despite the difficulty, as you do in endurance events or triathlons. You are often rewarded for doing so.

Are you going to participate in the ENGIE “Show your Energy” challenge?

Why not!  I’ve never been involved in a Group sporting event before.

If you were…

A source of energy? Water- a hydroelectric power station in the middle of the mountains.

A Group métier? An energy efficiency contract. I like the idea of taking the risk on someone else’s behalf and reaping common rewards.

A famous character? D’Artagnan, innocence and bravery at the service of an ideal.

An innovation? The tractor: the Uberisation of agricultural workers!

A hashtag: #archtoarc, for later**.

* The Ironman is one of the longest triathlons in the world. With a total distance of 226 kilometres (140.6 miles), an Ironman competition, is a multi-disciplinary race consisting of 3.8 km of swimming, 180.2 km of cycling and then a marathon (a 42.195 km race on foot), performed back-to-back.

** The Enduroman, nicknamed “Arch to Arc”, is an extreme triathlon event that begins at Marble Arch in London and ends at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. It consists of a cross-country race, a swimming race in white water and an ultimate phase of road cycling, performed back-to-back over several days.