0:10

You are listening to the cycling podcast.

0:27

Hello and joining you on January 24, 2024, that is

0:29

the 40th anniversary of Apple's first incarnation

0:34

of the Macintosh personal computer hitting

0:37

stores. The Mac, which New

0:39

York Times tech correspondent at the

0:41

time Eric Sandberg-Diment said would be

0:43

destined for greater things had it

0:45

been named the Granny Smith after

0:47

the variety of Apple's first discovered

0:49

by Maria Ann Smith aka Granny

0:51

Smith in Australia in 1868. And

0:55

so we get to our extremely tenuous

0:58

link to today's episode. My name is

1:00

Daniel Freeber. I'm the host of this

1:02

episode of the cycling podcast in which

1:04

we will set out why it was

1:06

a golden and delicious edition of Tour

1:08

Down Under and we'll get

1:10

to the core of some other big stories

1:12

developing in the world of cycling this week.

1:15

Joining me to do all of that

1:17

is the mustachioed maestro. We'll

1:19

be talking about mustaches. Mitch

1:22

Docker who has had a very busy week at

1:24

the Tour Down Under. Mitch, how are you doing?

1:26

You're looking quite bronze, don't I say? Well

1:29

yeah, well that's because I did ride

1:31

across the TDU. That's become something for

1:33

me the last couple of years. I

1:35

head out from my hometown here in

1:37

Lancefield, well Melbourne anyway, not too far

1:39

away and ride across there. Last

1:41

year I did it over five days. This year

1:43

I did it over three. I thought it'd be

1:45

a good idea just to challenge myself that bit

1:47

more. Yet I'm doing, I'm further

1:49

away from the pro peloton. I'm doing less

1:52

Ks yet I wanted to do it even harder. I'm

1:54

sick and like I literally probably 80K

1:57

into the first day I was like... This

2:00

was such a stupid idea

2:02

and of course I made it but it

2:06

was good. Like I'm fit. That's what you got to

2:08

do. I did all my fitness in

2:10

three days and I'm back where I used to be. Well,

2:12

maybe not back to world tour level but I'm at a

2:14

good level. What are we going to say? Inch

2:16

and have a closer. Who knows next year. Do

2:19

it in one day next year and maybe that comeback

2:21

will be on. Join is also

2:23

not from Down Under but

2:26

with Down Under as far as France is concerned.

2:28

I think he's in Marseille. It's Francois,

2:31

tout monsieur. Francois, how are you?

2:33

Not too bad actually. Not too bad. Not

2:36

too bad, yeah. In Down Under

2:38

Marseille. Francois, are you celebrating because

2:42

last time you were on the podcast it was

2:44

a speculation episode and

2:46

we talked about how you not

2:48

doing the Tour de France might

2:50

allow French riders to end their

2:53

drought in the Tour de

2:55

France. Well, I can tell you that this

2:57

week you should be celebrating because France won

2:59

the World Boulangerie Championships for the first time

3:01

in 16 years, ending a

3:04

16 year drought. Did

3:07

you know that? Did you follow the

3:09

World Boulangerie Championships? No, I missed that

3:12

but actually I saw a couple of stories

3:15

on TV about a few

3:17

cuisine, you know, World Championships and

3:20

France is the front and not

3:22

one for a while

3:24

and you know, coming

3:26

home. So yeah, keep posting. I mean,

3:28

we're back. We're back. So

3:31

I'm not referring to the Tour de

3:33

France and I mean, if my prediction comes

3:35

through, I think I really need to have

3:37

a statue on me, you know,

3:40

just in front of the headquarters of

3:42

ASO or something, you know, as we'll

3:44

see. I think the baguettes

3:46

might be coming home rather than

3:49

the Tour de France title. Who won

3:51

it then before France for the

3:53

last seven years? I'm not sure, I'm

3:55

not sure much but the favourite, I Know the favourites this

3:57

year were Taiwan and South Korea As you can tell. Grade

4:00

A real deep deep dive interests of

4:02

I'm here This is by the fact

4:04

is one do laundry Francois part two

4:06

thousand and have really France and forcefully

4:09

one thousand nine hundred and eighty five

4:11

of them A closed most of the

4:13

time am in my experience budget yet

4:15

have been in their the been in

4:17

the doldrums from swallows his talk among

4:20

the phrase with am Bruno said interviewed

4:22

by things in the pies yeah I

4:24

read about this and so the about

4:26

how inventive the Asian acres off and

4:28

them how they can't. Come. Compete

4:30

on that front with their humbled by

4:33

gets his say the same with why.

4:35

You know if you're looking through that

4:37

South Africa line was fine wines are

4:39

you know the mountain lions? It's actually

4:41

funny timelines I followed by didn't a

4:44

tourist guide recently still hoping actually invented

4:46

and abducted I sin money to buy

4:48

French guys him in the does of

4:50

the business world was and pm often

4:53

since they were planted in the mid

4:55

nineteenth century. The in abide by Tim

4:57

guzzles with of with the help of

4:59

the. French guy Sunday this week we

5:01

did. she freaks me to to the

5:03

front and then we don't with them

5:05

In this the things: success as a

5:07

cop out of the come right back

5:09

and things and tax receipts of us

5:12

and cycling I'm not tradition dictates. we

5:14

can start with a news roundup and

5:16

trunk even slightly more concise. this yes,

5:18

first way duty bound to journey to

5:20

Benidorm on the spice Costa Blanca for

5:22

some sites across. We have the latest

5:24

round of the World Cup bad weekend

5:26

and finally we also had a bit

5:28

of a surprise with Monsieur Fund. The

5:30

pool not taking first place many

5:32

because the crash and a saddle

5:34

us. I think multiple crises actually

5:36

been who aren't a saddle us

5:38

while we're not funny breaking B

5:40

M V D P Hex to

5:42

triumph. There was a rather unsavory

5:44

postscript to that which we might

5:46

mention in a minute. First will

5:48

cover the women's race and time.

5:50

That was when my symptom Van

5:52

Impose had put pizza and we

5:54

will also Teva Cell and Del

5:56

Carmen Oliver artist. Third place was

5:58

enough to come from. Her as

6:00

the overall Women's World Cup winner with

6:02

one round specs Chancellor said an unsavory

6:05

postscript did see the happened, did have

6:07

the misfortune seat the East Three D

6:09

Three Sacks about Classic I think is

6:12

cool now is net you chaps were

6:14

know that this race has become infamous

6:16

pretty tasteless adverts over the years beginning

6:18

of in way back in since two

6:21

thousand, two thousand and eleven thing with

6:23

the first one there are a couple

6:25

two thousand and fifteen, two thousand and

6:28

sixteen which one of them a particular.

6:30

Was based on Pizza Saigon

6:32

since I'm pinching incident. ah

6:34

ah it's which race without

6:36

without it saunders. Oh and

6:38

maybe the previous year game

6:40

by with him and them.

6:42

well they said about did

6:44

themselves this week am east

6:46

three by ear putting a

6:48

cartoon on F X for

6:50

me on his twitter say

6:52

Run Out Crossing the Line

6:55

subtle less as a said

6:57

with Sam was a representation

6:59

of real events. And then

7:01

some allusion to well the

7:03

Lg P B T T

7:06

community am enjoying. this is

7:08

obviously his said of com

7:10

sat away see posts was

7:13

picking up in the ass

7:15

on damn damn much of

7:17

Vanderpool fans supporting this a

7:20

rainbow jersey rainbow flag. Am

7:22

thinking that this was great

7:24

him having Src post Sam

7:27

sticking towards his backside am.

7:30

The. sweetest he laughs at

7:32

me with did find it

7:34

funny i'm however being serious

7:36

her moment possible that the

7:38

race organization eatery did apologists

7:40

i mean men fighting there

7:42

are no there are no

7:45

openly gay riders and think

7:47

visor a a a justifiable

7:49

of concern that it's it

7:51

has been a hostile environment

7:53

possibly for them any gay

7:55

by riders women's scene is

7:57

different from of course But

8:00

this, as I say, this is an

8:02

organisation with a pretty terrible record of

8:04

misogyny. So I saw some

8:06

replies to this, even people who said online

8:09

that they were gay, they were bi, they

8:11

found it funny, you

8:13

might say, well give them the

8:15

benefit of the doubt. I would

8:17

say that this organisation doesn't deserve

8:19

the benefit of any doubt based

8:21

on its past record. Any thought

8:23

that they were laughing with the

8:25

LGBTQ community and not at

8:27

them is sort of removed,

8:29

I would say, by their record on these

8:31

things. Well, it's obviously meant to

8:34

be offensive, so it's not funny, you know, that's

8:36

the thing. Yes, yes,

8:38

exactly. And you

8:40

know, one does wonder as well, they've done this

8:42

so many times that, you know, they are obviously

8:45

sort of self-proclaimed, as your own provocateurs,

8:48

but you kind of wonder why they

8:50

are doing it at this point, because

8:53

obviously the organisation, this race

8:55

has sponsors, has corporate

8:58

sponsors, SaxoBank in this case,

9:01

I struggle to believe that any kind of

9:03

corporate sponsor would be on board with this

9:05

or okay with this. No,

9:07

it can't be impressed at all, yeah.

9:10

It's a strange move, isn't it? You know, like, and they

9:12

think, sometimes I feel

9:15

someone just doesn't think and it goes

9:17

out and they're like, oh, whoops, we

9:20

didn't really think about that, did we? And

9:22

also, as far as the UCI is concerned, Chaps,

9:24

I mean, this is a world tour race, you

9:26

imagine, you know, a rider posting

9:28

something like that? I mean, we've had incidents in

9:31

the last couple of years of riders doing things

9:33

in poor taste, being suspended

9:35

by their teams or being

9:37

fined, even being suspended by

9:39

the UCI, so

9:41

again, pretty

9:44

difficult to understand. We should

9:46

move on, Chaps. We'll go

9:48

to the road first. The

9:51

cyclo-cross season, of course,

9:53

is winding down. The road racing

9:56

season is cranking back up or

9:58

cranking up. on the

10:00

European mainland began this weekend in Spain. Some

10:02

of the top women's teams have been

10:05

in Mallorca for their version of

10:07

the Challenge Mallorca. Three

10:09

rounds of that were

10:11

won by Nomi Huig of

10:14

EF Education Cannondale, Magdalen

10:16

Valier of EF Education Cannondale

10:19

again and Eleonora Gasparini

10:21

of UAE Team ADQ. Just

10:24

across the med on the Spanish

10:26

mainland Dylan Kronovegen won the classic

10:28

at Comunidad Valenciana and his JCo

10:30

teammate, JCo Lula teammate Michael Matthews

10:32

won the grand premiere of Castellon.

10:35

The men have also now moved

10:37

to Mallorca and the first round

10:39

of their Challenge Mallorca will take

10:41

place today I believe, that's Wednesday.

10:44

Big few days for Grand Tour

10:46

Wildcards, Total Energy and Uno X

10:48

have got the nod for the

10:50

Tour de France while

10:53

Team Polti Cometa, formerly Aeolu,

10:55

VFA Group, Bardiani,

10:59

GSF, Feizané and Tudor

11:01

Pro Cycling have been invited

11:03

to the Giro d'Italia. The

11:05

Giro d'Italia, his seventh stage, we should

11:07

remind you, is the Tudor individual time

11:10

trial from Foligno to Perugia. So real

11:12

shock that they got the wild card

11:14

there. Also remember that

11:16

Lotto Destiny and Israel

11:18

Premier Tech go to the Tour de

11:20

France by virtue of their ranking position

11:22

while Lotto have waived their right to

11:25

race the Giro and only Israel will

11:27

go. Francois, these

11:29

decisions, wild card announcements,

11:31

they always used to be sort of

11:34

shrouded in controversy, they always used to

11:36

be uproar, there was for a period

11:38

and there was one party, one team

11:40

that was very disappointed indeed. It

11:43

doesn't seem to be the case these days, I would

11:46

suggest that Total Energy and

11:48

Uno X were shoe-ins

11:50

pretty much, weren't they? There used to

11:52

be more rooms available, like four teams

11:54

could be in the Giro d'Italia in

11:57

the old days and it seems to

11:59

be... The Unity. The trimming

12:01

down on the on the white

12:03

gaza gradually soaks and I'm in.

12:05

Ah. To. That Nlcs thing since

12:07

gonna do last the team in two

12:09

thousand still don't All the tour de

12:11

France I couldn't see the will you

12:14

know whatever that their results i'm in

12:16

deposits is like cofidis. Been the website

12:18

minion of studio that there's. That.

12:20

There was no way too tight enough she

12:22

was not going to be of the detour,

12:25

the fast and the and obviously are you

12:27

know we're you know that a a so

12:29

you know seats and partly you know it

12:31

at the good relationship with you know x

12:34

far I've always heard that to some for

12:36

them speaker you know kindly about them and

12:38

none of the way to work so is

12:40

that up there was not as that that

12:43

was not the surprised by any means and

12:45

and and these days that these to be

12:47

problems when just french teams left out of

12:49

the sort. Of nonsense of the French president

12:52

we should have taken a french seems like

12:54

the times or do that on the zero

12:56

r us despite his on this but these

12:59

days and most of the French teams are

13:01

either of down the words were off on

13:03

how after funny now cmd ashore to be

13:05

doing its of I mean the controversies used

13:08

to crop up front of french team been

13:10

less out of it but it's not have

13:12

a to the case anymore side and I

13:14

don't think that the deaths that were too

13:17

many doubts about who would be tickets for

13:19

the to. Your mate

13:21

urge on one am gonna go

13:23

for saw the boss Toto. I

13:25

now see who I saw it

13:28

in into this week's as if

13:30

that's key tones. And sometimes eating

13:32

Cheetos was the only reason that

13:34

professional cycling wasn't the biggest boy

13:36

in the world. because of faith

13:39

ambiguous moral ambiguity this created which

13:41

and make me m mom raises

13:43

an eyebrow. My rights. A chuckle

13:45

Shops A footnote to the wild

13:47

caught announcement: you know X, You

13:49

know X mobility. announced in

13:52

the wake of a invitation to herself would

13:54

replace jinzhao glinda as the general manager of

13:56

the team haven't had previously held their own

13:58

of general manager for both Uno

14:00

X the teams, they have a women's team and a

14:03

development team as well, and Uno X

14:05

Norway the company, car washes, petrol

14:08

stations and so on. Jens,

14:10

we've had him on the podcast and he

14:13

is a very colourful, larger than life character

14:15

and he's been a real breath of fresh

14:17

air as general manager of that team. He

14:20

is, we believe, staying with the company

14:22

but has been replaced by Tor Huzov,

14:24

slightly disappointing news. I think Jens himself

14:27

will be slightly disappointed with

14:29

that news. We'll maybe speak to him in the next few

14:31

weeks. Staying in

14:33

Norway, we should inform listeners that

14:36

Edvald Boethenhagen, well the Edvald Boethenhagen

14:38

Ultras among our listeners, there are

14:40

one or two of them, will

14:42

be delighted that their idol will

14:44

ride for Decathlon Decathlon, Agy Doselle,

14:47

Lamondial in 2024. Rumours

14:50

had it that EBH was close

14:52

to retiring, not so. Meanwhile,

14:55

sadly, it is the end of

14:57

the road for our good friend,

14:59

sometime guest, Lately Astana rider,

15:02

Joe Dombrowski, who announced

15:04

last night that he is going to end his

15:06

pro career at age 32. Joe

15:08

won Giro Stage in 2021,

15:10

tour of Utah Stage and the

15:13

GC in 2015 and a 2019 tour of Utah Stage.

15:19

Joe, as I said, announced his retirement

15:21

just last night and well, this morning,

15:23

the morning after he sent us this

15:25

voice message. Hi everyone, it's

15:27

Joe Dombrowski. As you may have

15:29

seen, I announced my

15:31

retirement as a professional cyclist

15:34

yesterday. It was something I thought

15:36

a lot about before I

15:39

said anything to the public and actually

15:41

it was something that was not that

15:43

easy to actually say, to be honest.

15:46

I had a laugh last night, my

15:48

wife and I were eating dinner in

15:50

the kitchen and my doorbell rang and

15:52

packages don't normally come in the evening.

15:56

When we get a doorbell buzz at that time of

15:58

day, usually it's A little bit of a surprise. For

16:00

doping control and. Sure,

16:03

Enough, it was a Franti doping

16:05

and it was just funny because

16:07

we were all sitting there on

16:09

the kitchen table. Because it took

16:11

awhile, the doping control officer noticed

16:14

that my son was really buzzing

16:16

all the time and. I.

16:18

Said yeah me neither. I announced that I

16:21

was gonna retire as a cyclist an hour

16:23

ago. The whole thing was just a bit

16:25

ironic really because it was a nice surprise

16:27

and in a nice feeling that I I

16:30

received so many messages from so many different

16:32

people who has been a part of the

16:34

journey. I'm sort of just. Getting.

16:37

To all that now and. Doesn't want

16:39

to say thank you to everyone who

16:41

has reached out and thanks for following

16:43

along during my career. Yeah, I'm looking

16:46

forward to whatever comes next. I don't

16:48

know exactly what that is yet, but

16:50

I'm I'm kinda looking forward to that.

16:53

Finding. My next challenge. So thanks a

16:55

lot mates. A feeling that you know

16:58

small have expressed wants the morning after

17:00

the morning after a we will we

17:02

do with it was a choreographed retirement

17:04

was miss You knew that it can

17:07

be higher base perhaps slightly different birds

17:09

and can you remember that mean that

17:11

sensation are really can are really can

17:14

always rely on. I didn't finish free

17:16

vi and name We went back to

17:18

the hotel and. I.

17:20

Had sort of vibe i got up

17:22

early arm and a why he i'm

17:25

all saying at some. Not. My

17:27

team ourselves saying it my i'm at

17:29

the Grain and hotels I went back

17:31

and sort of parties on with those

17:34

boys and only if voices. When

17:36

harm so job I said to me come

17:38

back inside allies else I say that mild

17:40

hotel little bit to set sort of game

17:43

in ah in mela or woke up in

17:45

a walk up to the front room early

17:47

and I sort of at this time to

17:49

myself at wasn't probably that early committed least

17:52

as eight o'clock in the morning that pro

17:54

hours of super early L C in the

17:56

front room and really had this. Release.

17:59

this feeling like this weight was off my

18:01

shoulders. When you know it's time,

18:04

it feels like a weight. And

18:07

however long that is, for me it

18:09

was from the normal

18:11

Roubaix time, so April onwards I'd made

18:13

the announcement. And even though,

18:15

because I was talking to Simon Geschke over at

18:17

Tour Down Under this year, I said, you're going

18:20

to have some great moments this year because there's

18:22

stuff in races that you hate, but you can

18:24

weirdly flip it and enjoy it. This is the

18:26

last time I'll have to do this crosswind sector

18:28

in an eco tour or Bing Bank or whatever

18:31

the hell the name is now. You're like, how

18:33

cool is this? I'll never be back in this

18:35

crap. So there are moments like that you can

18:37

enjoy, but there was this weight that got lifted

18:40

off my shoulder. I distinctly remember that

18:42

morning being like, that's

18:44

done. How nice is this? But

18:47

of course then it's followed very soon after to

18:49

the scariness

18:51

of like, what next? What now?

18:54

It comes soon after, but I definitely had a

18:56

moment of like, yeah, this

18:58

is nice. This is cool. I'm done.

19:01

Very different. People always talk about

19:03

going out on their own terms and that scenario

19:05

you just described of knowing that it's going to

19:07

be your last crosswind section at the Eneco tour

19:09

or whatever, that applies to someone who's

19:12

announced or at least got it clear in their own

19:14

mind that they are going to retire on a certain

19:16

date. Joe's situation is more of a

19:18

sort of hybrid, I would suggest. I mean, I've

19:20

been speaking to him throughout the winter where at

19:23

times, well, he was certainly keen

19:25

to find another team. It

19:28

wasn't, I think he didn't feel that it was

19:30

a matter of life or death. He

19:32

was sort of reconciled to the idea that he might

19:35

have to retire and was okay with that. And

19:37

yeah, having heard from him this morning and been speaking

19:39

to him over the last few weeks, I think he

19:43

does feel slightly disoriented. So

19:46

it's interesting to hear you say that going

19:48

out on your own terms was important because

19:50

that is something that's often mentioned. I mean,

19:52

even, I'm thinking of Mark Cavendish now and

19:54

all the sort of speculation and debate about

19:56

whether he should, shouldn't do another year. And that

19:59

was one of the... things that

20:01

have been mentioned in relation to that that's

20:03

come up in conversations I've had with members

20:05

of his entourage should he

20:08

do what you did in effect? Well

20:11

look Cavendish is maybe in a different scenario

20:13

where he can sort of do that and

20:16

I think he will always sort of find

20:18

a contract whether it'll be the contract he's

20:20

happy with. Joe maybe

20:22

in a different scenario where you know he

20:24

probably wasn't willing to ride for nothing you

20:26

know and you know to a degree I

20:29

read the room early on in the year and went

20:31

you know it could be pretty difficult at the end

20:33

of this year for me to get another contract maybe

20:35

I could if I scratched around and got something for

20:38

a very low weight I sort of I

20:40

think the way I came up with it whether this was

20:42

a question or not was do I

20:44

have anything more to achieve? I sort

20:47

of went not really you know I know I'm not going to

20:49

win Roubaix as much as I'd love to that's probably out of

20:51

my realm have I sort of done

20:53

everything that I had hoped and am I

20:55

happy with it? Again I didn't win Roubaix

20:57

I didn't you know win the Tour de France I didn't

20:59

ride the Tour de France so those

21:01

are some things that I was sort of like cool but

21:03

I realized that probably wasn't going to happen in the next

21:05

year with one last contract so I was like I'm actually

21:07

pretty happy where I'm at why don't I

21:09

try and go out in my own terms rather than get to

21:11

October and then realize it's sort of forced on me so sort

21:14

of got ahead of the eight ball early

21:18

on and I think the change of the date

21:20

of Roubaix really suited me because I was like

21:23

I ultimately can finish with my favorite race no

21:25

matter what happens and that was a really nice

21:27

scenario for me and it really even though the

21:29

race got taken from me it sort of just

21:31

showed me the light I was

21:33

like you know what this is it you can't have

21:35

it any better than this mate you can finish on your

21:38

favorite race so it

21:40

doesn't happen like that for a lot of people

21:42

because you know as you described with Joe I

21:44

don't actually know Joe's story I'd be interested to

21:46

hear how that sort of formulated but you

21:49

can come to the end of the year very

21:51

quickly and realize shit I haven't got something and

21:55

you know teams are sort of waiting for you

21:57

and this scenario this is something when

21:59

I say the way off your shoulders, this is something

22:01

I do not miss. I do

22:03

not miss this living on the edge of your seat year

22:06

in year out or even at the very luxury of

22:08

two years. So that's something that

22:10

Joe will certainly love moving into that

22:12

next phase. Yeah, one

22:14

thing, there have been a

22:16

few riders this winter who have been in this

22:19

situation that I've sort of had a bit of

22:21

a running conversation with and the

22:23

doubt as well about whether, I

22:25

mean to put it bluntly, whether your agent is

22:28

speaking to the right people and having the right

22:30

conversations and just that question mark. Is there a

22:32

team out there who I'm not aware of who

22:34

might take me if, for example, I present

22:37

my case in the right way or my agent

22:39

does? And yeah, I can imagine that that is

22:42

a bit of a head scratcher.

22:44

Yeah, I will also mention before in another

22:46

part, but I think

22:49

you, Daniel, mentioned the fact that

22:51

the average age

22:53

in the World Tour is going down

22:56

every year and that when you pass

22:58

30 these days, is it becoming more

23:01

and more difficult to find a team

23:03

when we have we'll discuss, you know,

23:05

the new Mexicans, superstars, the

23:08

new sensation of the

23:10

world cycle. But every year that there's more

23:12

and more young guys coming in. And is

23:14

that a problem for the older ones? I don't

23:17

know. It's just a question. I don't have

23:19

the answer to that. But I my impression

23:21

at the moment is that there's a tendency

23:23

to hire more younger guys and to get

23:25

rid of the older guys, you know,

23:27

their experience. I mean, what's an argument being

23:30

an exception, obviously. I mean, look at you,

23:32

Francois, we've kicked you out of our Twitter

23:34

front podcast. Yeah,

23:36

absolutely. No, I went on my own.

23:38

Yeah, he did. Yeah,

23:40

the viscos with my parallel

23:42

being. Your own Michelin-starred

23:44

terms. Chaps, I was

23:47

just going to mention one more thing in

23:49

the news round before we conclude. And part

23:51

one, about a week ago, La Gazeta de

23:53

los Sport did something

23:55

that they do pretty much every year

23:57

where they produced a list of professional

24:02

Char number one, six million

24:04

euros, Primoz Roglicz 4.5 in

24:06

second place, Jonas Vinkov 4

24:09

million, Mathieu van der Poel 4 million,

24:11

Wout van Aert 3.5 million, Remco Vainipool

24:14

2.8 million, Tom Pidcock 2.7 million,

24:16

Adam Yates 2.7 million, Egan Bernal 2.5 million, En

24:22

Carlos Oroluwiez 2.5 million. Jonathan

24:25

Vortas tweeted that this was

24:27

basically all nonsense. It

24:29

does tickle me as well that particularly

24:32

like I said, always publishes

24:34

a list of this nature every

24:36

year based I'm pretty sure on

24:38

a lot of speculation. They

24:41

will be having conversations with agents. Agents

24:43

aren't the best source in these cases

24:45

because obviously it's in their interest to

24:47

suggest I don't know their riders are

24:49

earning more than they are or not

24:51

earning as much as they are. And

24:54

it just reminds me Chaps, I

24:56

saw, I sort of got a

24:58

peek behind the curtain of one

25:00

of these features being written for

25:03

a different media outlet many years

25:05

ago at the Tour de France. I think it was 2004 Tour de France. One

25:07

of our

25:10

colleagues, you both know him. I'm

25:12

not going to give

25:14

his name. We'll call him Bruce. Bruce

25:16

one day at the Tour

25:18

de France, one day in the press room, I

25:21

could see him sort of shuffling along the pews

25:23

in the Tour de France press room. And

25:26

he was asking everyone pretty much the same question.

25:28

He was just giving sort of riders names on

25:30

Menchop. How much do you think Menchop earns? How

25:32

much do you think Contador earns? And so on

25:34

and so on. And he got to me and I said,

25:36

so Bruce, what's this for? And he said, oh, I'm just

25:38

doing an article, Freibs

25:42

about the top earners in the sport. Anyway,

25:45

I saw this particular journalist a day

25:47

or so later in the Stark village

25:49

looking pretty downcast. And I said,

25:51

what's wrong, Bruce? And he said, oh, that

25:53

article didn't go down too well. And apparently

25:56

Matt White, another good friend of the podcast,

25:58

who I think was running for credit. coffee-diss

26:00

that year had

26:02

seen Bruce on the other side of the

26:04

Stark village that morning and

26:06

shouted out to him words to the effect

26:09

of Bruce where did

26:11

you get those figures from mate

26:13

out of your ass a

26:17

pretty fair representation of how these stories are

26:19

often created but it did make me think

26:22

Mitch how much awareness is there of

26:24

what other guys are earning in the peloton different

26:28

to any other job I suspect

26:30

is probably similar to other jobs where you might know

26:32

you might have a colleague who is quite open about

26:34

these things and will tell you and others who will

26:36

never tell you it's very much like that and I

26:39

think as you as you go on I was going

26:41

to mention this about the managers before as

26:43

you go on you sort of need a manager less

26:45

and less because you start to understand what you're worth

26:48

early on I think managers are very good for

26:50

riders because they actually don't know how much they're

26:52

worth and how much they can go for and

26:54

oh wow I'm worth that great if we can get that

26:56

awesome and at the end of your career you sort of

26:59

go you know what I'm probably gonna get that

27:01

you know I probably can't get this so let's try and

27:03

go in the middle and I think

27:05

also this is slightly off the wage is that

27:07

I think you can pitch yourself better at the end your

27:09

career to go back on the experience role I

27:12

just don't think managers pitch the experience role well

27:14

enough they keep saying what the writers can and

27:16

can't do you know this guy's this this guy's

27:18

that it's like as a righty-like cool look I

27:20

know sort of what I can do what you

27:22

need to tell me is what I can do

27:24

off the bike what I can answer the team

27:26

off the bike and in the

27:29

race as a captain as a experience

27:31

I don't think that gets that that

27:33

story gets told well enough from

27:36

the managers side of things they're more just like look he

27:38

can win this race or he can do with the classics

27:40

or he can do this in the tour you know and

27:42

obviously most teams go well he hasn't done that for 10

27:44

years so we know that's bullshit but they

27:46

just keep pushing that that out but when

27:49

it comes to wages especially my own experience towards

27:51

the end of my career let's say the last

27:53

three or four years most

27:55

of the Most of the negotiations I

27:57

did myself when it came to the final. Feelings

28:00

of the contract or not as I cope

28:02

able to measure reminds you that, but I

28:04

think that personal touches more important when you

28:06

speak and it's aims. You.

28:09

Know what one person it is probably

28:11

have to buy the stories from Africa

28:13

Fair speakers are you know with Evan

28:15

a pool earning you know with us

28:17

at least twice less than nuts and

28:20

but what? Modern twice live in classrooms

28:22

and almost was live in videogames. Shows

28:24

that you know the reputation of stinginess

28:26

from men in Africa. Squish is is

28:28

deserve than you know. He manages to

28:31

teams. I see his Us. Cause

28:37

cause the fact that set Pk The Voice

28:39

of Radio to to remind us to tell

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you that this episode is sponsored by Babbel

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language and we will put those details

30:46

in the show notes. Lionel

30:48

a long time no I'm not going

30:50

to say C because I did C

30:52

recently even in person as well as

30:55

virtually I've seen rather a lot of

30:57

you virtually recently. I bought you a

30:59

snowflake oat milk a Chino Daniel let's

31:01

just forget it. Happy new year by the

31:03

way. Yeah went down the street as well.

31:05

Happy new year to you Lionel. Lionel

31:08

since we've got you here there've

31:10

been a few questions not

31:12

only in the last week but over the last

31:15

few weeks few months about you

31:17

and the podcast you've not been hosting

31:19

the podcast as often as was once

31:22

the case I believe that you'd like

31:24

to share something to say with the

31:26

listeners. Well yeah I think we should

31:28

be open and transparent with the listeners

31:30

who've supported us some some

31:32

of them since the very beginning ten years

31:34

ago. Yeah I intended to have a break

31:36

over the winter and

31:39

over the winter over

31:41

Christmas really I came to a

31:43

decision and that is having spent

31:45

21. Didn't want to do the

31:47

podcast with me anyway. Are you

31:50

delivering this message from under the floorboards

31:52

in my house in an orange boiler

31:54

suit? No I know it doesn't relate

31:57

to you at all Daniel it's got

31:59

nothing It's got nothing to do with

32:01

you. It's purely a

32:03

decision that I've made having spent

32:05

21 of the past 25 summers

32:08

away from home covering the Tour de France.

32:10

I don't want to do that this year.

32:12

I've decided it's time for a change of

32:15

focus. So you're gonna do the Giro and

32:17

the Welker this year. I'm putting down the

32:19

mic, or rather, I'm passing on

32:21

the mic. I'm passing on the mic. Now,

32:23

that doesn't mean that my commitment to the

32:25

Cycling Podcast is gonna be diminished in any

32:27

way. In fact, I think it will help me

32:29

to focus my energies in

32:32

a more constructive way behind

32:35

the scenes, I suppose. I've found

32:37

it quite difficult splitting my focus

32:39

between the journalism side of what

32:41

we do, the most important

32:44

thing, which is the podcast and what we

32:46

put out. But there has

32:48

been quite a significant

32:50

development over 10 years building what

32:53

has become a business,

32:55

a company, and that requires maintenance

32:57

and work and focus as well.

32:59

And I just can't split my brain in two. And

33:02

I find it hard to go from one to

33:05

the other. I find it hard to try and

33:07

do both at once. And so I feel

33:09

that in order to be more effective

33:12

and in order to kind of reduce

33:14

some of my own internal conflict and

33:16

tension about my working life, I need

33:18

to focus on one thing or the

33:20

other. And I've chosen to step

33:23

back into the shadows somewhat. I'll

33:27

be in HQ, counting the bidons and

33:29

stacking them neatly, making sure the logos

33:31

all face out in the right way. And

33:34

rather than just kind of take a year off from the

33:37

Tour de France or a period off from the Tour de

33:39

France, I feel that it's

33:41

better for the cycling podcast and better for

33:43

the listeners if we

33:45

pass the microphone on and create

33:48

a new team. That

33:51

won't happen if I'm kind of

33:53

hogging one of the seats, I

33:55

feel. That's my decision. I'm gonna

33:57

step into, step behind the curtain,

33:59

Daniel. We'll still talk regularly. I

34:01

mean daily probably. Lionel, we'll get back to

34:03

my other co-host for this week in just

34:05

a minute But I think what you're saying

34:08

is that you're not well You're not targeting

34:10

the Giro in the world to instead of

34:12

the tour That's not what you're announcing You're

34:14

also not announcing that you are leaving the

34:16

cycling podcast to start I don't

34:19

know the ski jumping podcast and doing a

34:21

reverse roll glitch Lionel, if

34:23

I'm sure the listeners might have some more questions You

34:26

are going to maybe address some of the questions they will

34:29

have in the 1 minute past 11 cappuccino

34:32

newsletter on Substack this week Some

34:35

of our listeners might want to put

34:37

comment on your post with questions You

34:40

can ask me questions on Twitter X

34:43

I won't guarantee that I'll answer all of them

34:45

Particularly those that are, if

34:47

they're impertinent or impolite, I won't

34:49

answer them But we

34:51

will try to be as transparent

34:54

as possible about what's going to happen over the

34:56

next few months Yeah, there's obviously been a lot

34:58

of change over the last couple of years on

35:00

the cycling podcast We want to ensure that as

35:02

it involves it remains true to the founding

35:05

spirit really Which is friends who happen to

35:07

be journalists talking about cycling or journalists who

35:09

happen to be friends Whichever way you want

35:11

to look at it And

35:14

so this isn't an end

35:16

of anything This is a

35:18

new beginning We've been active in the

35:20

January transfer window haven't we Daniel We'll

35:22

have some plans to announce shortly And

35:25

as I say, if you do have a

35:27

question about the cycling podcast, drop us a

35:29

line Look out for the 1101 cappuccino

35:31

or drop us a line Contact

35:34

at thecyclingpodcast.com Thank

35:36

you everyone who has sent a comment

35:39

my way All of

35:41

your comments have been deeply appreciated over the

35:43

years And I'm not going to be a

35:45

complete stranger I will still

35:47

be here at the cycling podcast HQ If

35:50

you need any bidons counting Daniel Or

35:52

ads reading So gentlemen, we have

35:54

already talked about some of the racing in the

35:57

last few days Some of the racing Spain for

35:59

example, of course The main event

36:01

of the last week or so

36:04

was the Tour Down Under, first

36:06

event on the Women's World Tour

36:08

calendar and the men's. Just

36:11

a quick recap, the women's race was

36:13

won by Sarah Gigante of AG Insurance,

36:16

Sue Dahl, she won the last stage,

36:18

or the decisive

36:20

stage on Willunga Hill.

36:22

Is it Willunga Hill, Mitch, or old

36:25

Willunga Hill? Willunga, yeah, Willunga Hill, but

36:27

you just say Willunga. Why

36:30

do I think old Willunga Hill? I

36:32

think it is that. I

36:34

think it actually is the old Willunga Hill.

36:36

I don't know why. I think there's another

36:38

way up there, main road, and that's probably

36:40

the old road up, but no one would

36:42

refer to it as the old Willunga. Okay.

36:46

Anyway, Sarah Gigante won there,

36:48

which wrapped up the GC

36:50

for her other stage winners

36:52

in the women's race was

36:54

Cecily Utrup Ludwig of FDJ

36:56

Suez and Ali Wollaston of

36:58

AG Insurance Sue Dahl. The

37:01

men's stage winners, I'll go with stage winners

37:03

first, Sam Wells would have won the first

37:05

stage, Isaac Del Toro, more about him later.

37:09

Sam Wells would have won the third

37:12

stage and the fourth stage, and

37:14

then we got into the last two, the hilly

37:16

decisive stages. They were won by Oscar

37:18

Onley, and then

37:20

Stephen Williams won the last

37:23

stage on Mount Lofty, which

37:25

gave him victory overall

37:28

for Israel Premier Tech. Mitch,

37:31

you were there, as you

37:34

are always at the Tour of

37:36

Down Under, as previously discussed. I

37:38

said in my intro that it was

37:40

golden and a delicious addition. General

37:43

consensus, I've not been to the Tour

37:45

of Down Under, but general consensus among the people

37:48

I speak to is that Stuart O'Grady as

37:50

race director, he's been race director for a

37:52

couple of years now, is doing a good

37:54

job there, and this event is

37:57

one that continues to grow and thrive. guys

38:00

would absolutely love the press room.

38:04

There is a fridge with ice cream in it.

38:06

There's another fridge with

38:08

an assortment of drinks, beer, wine.

38:10

They bring in pizza. I was

38:13

like, this is ridiculous. There's free

38:15

Wi-Fi and it's in the bottom

38:17

of the Hilton. There's a

38:20

barista there purely for the press room

38:23

making coffees. Nothing more

38:25

to be said about the TVU. That's done. It's

38:29

fun. Being a press, whatever you want

38:31

to call it, a media person

38:34

there working on a journalist. I

38:37

dare I say on that. Going

38:39

into the start village is super fun. There's like

38:41

three of you in there and you just cruise

38:43

in, cruise around. Anytime the riders want to get

38:45

away from you, they're in these vans and

38:48

you literally walk up to the window and just knock, knock, knock.

38:50

They look across you and you're like, interview?

38:52

They're like, all right. You don't have to

38:54

deal with the press officers. You don't have

38:56

to deal with the buses with the mirror

38:59

windows. It's brilliant. You

39:01

guys are missing out. The

39:04

race itself, it's just before we get to the race, the

39:07

special thing about Down Under is it's

39:10

in Adelaide obviously, but it's in

39:12

the Hilton. It's one spot. All

39:15

these festival vibes build up around the

39:17

city. People try and ask me, is it the

39:19

same as the tour? I'm so

39:21

different of the tour because I've only ever been on

39:23

the other side of the fence and the

39:26

tour moves. It's the rolling show. The show rolls

39:28

on. Everyone's there. You're moving around and it's

39:30

great when you're there in that town, but T.D.U.,

39:33

it was for sure the brands, they built

39:35

up these pop-ups and they've got events going

39:37

every night and the riders, because it's early

39:40

season, we had Sam Wellsford after

39:42

he won his final

39:44

stage on his birthday pop into a

39:46

live interview that we had an

39:48

hour after the stage finish. I

39:50

was just spruiking it up going, we've got

39:52

Sam Wellsford tonight coming into the map specialised

39:54

pop-up. When could this ever happen

39:57

in another race? I can't think of another race

39:59

where this happens. The

40:01

crowds are super awesome, anyone who's

40:03

around just loves it and frosts off the

40:05

atmosphere. So it's a big pitch

40:07

for TDU, but it really

40:09

is a really, really fun week and worthwhile

40:12

and there's heaps of cyclists there. When it

40:14

gets to the race, for

40:16

me, I do find the race

40:18

quite boring in terms of it

40:21

is an early season race and there's

40:23

not guns firing and the one day

40:25

for me anyway where fireworks could have

40:28

gone, the stage for Murray Bridge. There

40:30

was no wind, so that became a

40:32

boring sprint stage, but I

40:34

think Stuart O'Grays doing an awesome thing which he

40:36

added in this year, the Walunga Hill, which traditionally

40:39

used to be the final deciding stage. He

40:41

put in the Mount Lofty stage, which

40:43

last year featured as the final stage.

40:45

They took Walunga Hill out. This year they

40:48

added both. So Saturday you had

40:50

Walunga Hill, then Sunday you had

40:52

the Mount Lofty. So it wasn't

40:54

done and dusted at Walunga on Saturday and we

40:56

used to come in and do a ceremonial crit

40:58

on Sunday and now it was

41:00

Lofty. You still have to defend

41:02

the title of Mount Lofty. I

41:05

think the women's race too was

41:08

a really good addition, really exciting coming

41:10

into Walunga Hill. I

41:12

really enjoyed that as well and again, we

41:14

were able to tap into interviewing Sarah Jugante.

41:17

We had the whole AG Insurance team there

41:19

as well, plus the Life Plus Waahu girls

41:21

there. So it's just a great access to

41:23

the riders, not only for me as a journalist, but

41:25

for the fans. You get to

41:28

see these guys, they go on all the rides

41:30

with the sponsors, they're mixing in. It's

41:33

a super good atmosphere and I ask the riders,

41:35

a lot of them, one of my questions I

41:37

ask them, which will be coming up on my

41:39

own podcast, The Talking Loaves, why is

41:41

it good starting the season out here at Tour

41:44

Down Under? What's the benefit? They

41:46

all said it, the obvious things, the weather, the

41:49

one hotel, the relaxed atmosphere, even

41:51

though it doesn't seem half as relaxed when I

41:53

did it, but even though it's comparative to what

41:56

the other racers are, they get

41:58

an element of it, it is toned down. and

42:00

there's a race at the end. But that

42:02

comes back to Stuart O'Grady. Understanding

42:05

being a rider and understanding what they

42:07

need, not putting an uphill start in

42:09

the beginning of the season, not putting

42:11

epic stages, understanding there still needs

42:13

to be exciting racing but keeping it in the

42:15

back end. So I agree with you,

42:18

Shuey's had an awesome job taking over from Mike

42:20

Turda. Mitch,

42:24

you mentioned there the sort

42:26

of the soft-ish,

42:29

they contrive to have a

42:31

soft-ish start to the season.

42:33

The stages aren't too long

42:36

and Willunga Hills, I think 3.4 kilometers,

42:39

Mount Lofty is not a

42:41

long climb either. But does

42:43

that mean, and this will bring us on to

42:45

some of the sort of stars and star performances

42:47

of the week, that one

42:50

should be careful of interpreting

42:52

this race with one's Tour

42:54

Down Under goggles on, i.e.

42:57

reading too much into this race. Either

42:59

the sprints, because the sprints, you

43:03

might say they're quite different from some of the

43:05

sprints that the peloton will face in a few

43:07

weeks time in Europe. You know the roads are

43:09

wide in Australia, I mean the

43:11

Tour Down Under. Sam

43:15

Wells for the winning three stages here does not

43:17

necessarily mean that he's going to be the dominant

43:19

sprinter. And then that

43:21

applies as well to some of the

43:24

climbing performances and GC performances we may have

43:26

seen the last few days. Is that

43:28

del Toro? It's not necessarily the next

43:30

Pade Poggaccio. But generally speaking, do you

43:32

think there is a danger that we

43:34

read too much into what happens at

43:36

this race? Yes and no.

43:39

I know the sitting on the fence but look I would

43:41

say that yes a few years ago. But I

43:43

think the importance of

43:45

every single race these days and you

43:47

know the Tour Down Under gaining points

43:50

and just getting a winner, it's

43:52

much harder to do what Stevie Williams did

43:54

and even what Wellsford did. You know Caleb

43:56

Bewan, he wants to start with Green Edge

43:58

on the right foot. And

44:01

we wasn't, no one was gifting any

44:03

victories there, Viviani as well, you know,

44:05

Inyos were lining it out. And I've

44:07

got to give credit to the Borah

44:09

Train. That is a well-drilled train. And

44:12

I think they started the season well and I, I

44:15

believe that they will go on and do great things

44:17

this year because of that train with Mullen

44:20

and also Van Poppel. If

44:22

you take Welsford out of it, his performance

44:25

was amazing as well. But if

44:27

you look at how well that train was drilled and

44:29

the performance they did and how well they stuck together,

44:31

I think they're going to go on

44:33

to do great things this year throughout the season

44:35

with Sam. Sam's rolling in now with huge

44:38

confidence. Plus he's got that

44:40

raw power. You saw it. He

44:42

was able to step out, go mano a

44:44

mano against Caleb Ewan and just put him

44:47

away cleanly. So as we

44:49

know Caleb Ewan's no, you know, he's no What's

44:53

the word I'm looking for? He's no amateur.

44:56

He's no, you know, slog. He knows what

44:58

to do. So I was

45:00

really impressed with that when it comes to Del Toro.

45:03

I thought he was going to walk away with this.

45:05

I was like, that's it. That stage was again

45:08

like, well, Israel's doing this lead out

45:10

for Corbin Strong. He and

45:12

the guys are just doing pealers. He steps

45:14

off them like, like they just, like me

45:16

riding out there doing my ride across the

45:18

Adelaide. So that was, it was

45:20

quite surprising for me that he didn't feature in

45:23

those as much as I thought in those final

45:25

two stages. I got caught up in the

45:27

hype as well, but I wouldn't underestimate

45:29

these results. Let's rewind sort of five,

45:32

maybe even ten years ago. Yes,

45:35

I 100% agree with you. Don't get too carried

45:37

away with this, but things have changed. Remember

45:39

the edition, remember the edition when Greipel won? How

45:41

many stages was it? Six or seven stages? That

45:43

was his sort of first, that was his arrival

45:45

on the world stage. And in

45:48

fairness, he did deliver on that over

45:51

the next two or three years. Do

45:53

you know how many stages he's won of Tour Down Under? I

45:58

would suggest. I think. 18

46:00

he's the most he's got the most ages of John

46:03

under Yes,

46:06

it's it's it's gone

46:08

up a notch for sure It's definitely gone up a

46:10

notch, but the good thing about it is a great

46:13

he has kept it to its true Tradition

46:16

of two down under let's not get too carried away

46:18

Let's make it hard enough for let's keep it still

46:20

a first season up first race

46:22

of the season Unfortunately, I've never been to

46:24

the to down under I wasn't invited a

46:26

couple of times But he just

46:28

didn't fit into my my season. I was doing

46:31

the lot of skiing at the time So I

46:33

couldn't be at both the skin in Europe and

46:35

the to down under I

46:37

think as you say it's probably great that a

46:39

tool like that and with that kind of atmosphere

46:41

is at the start of the of The

46:44

world tour because it reminds me what he's telling me Of

46:48

another pretty young event, which is the

46:50

other Canada Canadian ground Ground

46:52

freezing came back in Montreal where you have also

46:54

one hotel easy access to the to the riders

46:56

and the fact that some a lot Of riders

46:59

is the last race of the season because they're

47:01

not going to the words of I'm not going

47:03

to the WhatsApp Well, obviously because they're there You

47:06

know Means you've got a

47:08

different atmosphere and a more relaxed atmosphere I

47:10

mean the same time that there are events

47:12

like the to down under that there was

47:14

lots of doubts and

47:17

skepticism when they were launched and now

47:20

That you know that the place in

47:22

the world tour is not disputed anymore

47:24

I mean so, you know to start

47:26

in Australia finished in Canada with different

47:29

the consonants different atmosphere I think is

47:31

great for the sport and also I

47:33

mean Stephen Williams The

47:35

guys win this type of races

47:37

like you know, soon Williams. There

47:39

were guys I mean When

47:43

the tour of Norway last year I think

47:45

remember I mean the Arctic race

47:48

well, I mean this these are the Williams

47:51

is the type of rider that you know to win

47:53

that sort of Events and

47:56

of course it will probably never win a grand

47:58

tour. But you know this I

48:01

think that's fine. I mean, you

48:03

need this kind of one-week event,

48:06

designed for these type of

48:08

riders at a special

48:11

moment in the season. And

48:13

I always follow the Tour

48:15

Down Under with great interest. I think it

48:18

gives clues to what's going

48:20

to happen in the rest of the

48:22

season. Maybe not on the classics

48:24

or maybe not on the grand tours. But

48:26

if you look at the World Tour calendar

48:30

at large, yes, I think

48:32

it gives indications of what to expect. Well,

48:35

it was an incredible win by Stephen

48:37

Williams-Chaps. I mean, this is a rider

48:40

who, if you

48:42

remember, had an absolutely catastrophic

48:44

first season as a professional

48:46

rider. He'd had a brilliant

48:49

last year at NAMA 2018 in races like the Baby Giro, and

48:54

then turned pro with Bahrain-Marida, I think they

48:56

were called at that time. I think he

48:59

did eight race days in his first year,

49:02

had one of these knee injuries that

49:04

no one could diagnose properly. And they

49:06

eventually got to the bottom of it.

49:09

He had a part of a bone

49:11

or a bone, a Fabella bone removed.

49:14

But at the end of his

49:16

first two years, Bahrain-Marida, I would

49:18

suggest that had he not been

49:20

in a team managed by a

49:23

British coach, Rod

49:26

Ellingworth, British director of sportive, and he

49:28

might have fallen off the edge of the

49:30

earth as far as professional cycling is concerned, Rod

49:33

gave him another contract, another two

49:35

years. Well, he's

49:38

demonstrated certainly since then that he

49:40

very much belongs at the

49:42

top level. One in places

49:44

like Croatia won a stage of the tour of Switzerland last

49:47

year as well. And you mentioned,

49:50

one of you mentioned points. That

49:53

was a vital, what was a brilliant week

49:55

for Israel Premier Tech as far as UCI

49:57

points are concerned there, a team that's obviously

49:59

well, It's been relegated once already and

50:01

it's very much in the sort of fight

50:03

to get promoted again Frozler

50:07

I was gonna ask you I was gonna

50:09

throw you this hot potato and Israel Premier

50:11

Tech obviously This is

50:13

a team that sort of in

50:16

it is a kind of

50:18

de facto National

50:20

team as far as that their

50:22

owner is concerned Sylvan Adams wants them

50:24

to represent Israel we

50:27

are of course in the midst of a war

50:29

in the Middle East and between Israel

50:31

and well Hamas and Very

50:36

difficult to well very difficult

50:38

to know how to approach this Topic

50:41

and the riders themselves there isn't a

50:43

single rider on Israel Premier Tech. I

50:45

was I would guess I would suggest

50:47

who would not Want

50:52

the fighting to stop the war to stop We've

50:55

said many times that these rides unfortunately and this

50:57

applies to a lot of sponsors in the world

50:59

tour They are sort of pawns and they don't

51:01

have a lot of choice a lot of the

51:03

time. It's not as though they can Choose

51:06

any world tour team to represent there are a

51:08

couple of them Pogach or Vinga God could could

51:10

represent any team But most of them have to

51:13

go where there is a spot where there is

51:15

a possibility to ride So,

51:17

you know, they are not sort of

51:19

diplomats in track suits To

51:22

use a term that were used to be

51:24

used in East Germany of their own volition,

51:26

but they do have Israel on their Jersey

51:32

There's been a bit of talking last couple of weeks about what's

51:34

going to happen with Israel at

51:36

the Olympics, for example in

51:39

Paris this year whether the

51:42

same Sanctions should be

51:44

placed on Israel as have been

51:46

placed on Russia, for example

51:51

As a result of what's happening in the Middle East

51:53

and for as well What are your feelings when you

51:55

see an Israel Premier Tech rider? Winning

51:58

a race like this. Now, do you think how do you

52:00

think? name I feel about it. It's

52:02

not funny but what's interesting is if you look

52:04

at the war tour the way it was before

52:07

the war broke up, it was kind

52:09

of the other agreements between some

52:12

of the Emirates and Israel. Remember

52:14

that before a mass truck, Israel

52:16

was on the verge of signing

52:18

an agreement with Saudi Arabia and

52:20

already signed deals

52:22

and peace treaties with some

52:25

of the Arabic countries around. And

52:29

in the cycling war tour, you had Israel and you had

52:31

UAE and Bahrain. I mean it

52:33

was kind of a reflection of

52:35

the state of the world at

52:37

that stage which was that you

52:39

could have two teams represented

52:43

Emirates and also a team represented

52:45

Israel and all those

52:47

teams competing together which in itself was

52:50

already and we probably never saw it

52:52

this way enough but

52:54

was kind of a hopeful message in

52:56

a way. Yeah, it was a

52:59

hopeful message when you think that in football,

53:01

Israel played in the

53:03

European zone to

53:05

avoid playing in the Asian zone

53:08

for a long time. So there was a

53:10

political issue that cycling maybe

53:12

unwittingly absolved. Does the

53:14

new situation change anything?

53:17

I really don't think that from my point

53:19

of view, from the point of view of

53:21

the fan and probably from the point of

53:23

view of the riders and from the point

53:25

of view of lots of people in two

53:27

cycling never really saw UAE team Emirates as

53:29

the national team of the Emirates or

53:32

Bahrain. It sounds that it's just sponsors in

53:34

a way. I don't think Israel Private Tech

53:36

was ever seen, maybe it's

53:39

seen by its owners

53:41

as a flagship.

53:45

That's the thing with this team. This team,

53:47

people might see the name and think that

53:49

it is a government organ or entirely sponsored

53:51

by the government. That's not the case. I

53:53

think Sylvan Adams has been on record to

53:55

say that the team gets a pitiful amount

53:57

from the Israeli government. And this is really

53:59

a big deal. really his kind of passion

54:02

project he feels very strongly about Israel and

54:04

the role that it played for example

54:06

for his family in the lives of

54:08

his family and consequently he wants

54:10

to tell the world what an

54:13

incredible place Israel is. At

54:15

the same time if he wanted to make

54:17

life easier for himself to just take Israel

54:19

out of the team name and call it

54:21

from a tech and nobody would care you

54:23

know that it's an Israeli team or well

54:25

it's you know it's Israeli, you can age

54:27

you know whatever you want to call it

54:29

but anyway and about Israel and the

54:31

Olympics I mean we're going a

54:33

little bit away but you mentioned that in my

54:36

opinion given the IOC policy

54:38

if I say on politics generally

54:40

it's very very rare that IOC

54:42

actually ban a country I mean

54:44

they're very conservative towards that and

54:48

in the same time the French government is

54:50

supporting Israel in the same time by asking

54:52

for a unit to state solution so I

54:54

really can't see you know Israel being banned

54:57

from the Olympics I mean to me there's

54:59

a 0.5% chance of that happening

55:02

anyway. The Russian foreign

55:05

minister Sergei Lavrov recently

55:07

well he highlighted the the

55:10

disparity as he sees it between the

55:13

treatment of Russia well he

55:16

called it an outrageous disparity between the way

55:18

IOC has treated Russia and

55:20

the way they're not treating Israel.

55:22

There were doping issues as well with

55:24

Russia I mean you know of course

55:27

you have the invasion of Ukraine but

55:29

before that the Sochi you

55:31

know doping scandal was was one

55:33

of the you know greatest state

55:35

you know monitored doping scandal ever

55:37

I don't think Israel has had

55:39

you know doping issues in

55:41

the past I mean to that extent so

55:43

I mean Lavrov has been of course diplomatic

55:45

but also a little bit hypocritical there. Mitch

55:47

we're gonna move on from this but I

55:49

just wanted to ask you whether you think

55:52

there'd be any sort of queasiness on the

55:54

part of the riders you know you're good

55:56

friends I think with well for example Sam

55:58

Bewley who's the director for TV. We've had

56:00

town under last week and various other

56:02

members of that team. As I said,

56:05

this is a position a lot of

56:07

riders currently find themselves in. They're representing

56:09

whether it's a state or a company

56:11

with some question

56:13

marks, some more than others,

56:16

by their name, by their reputation. I think I

56:18

mentioned before on the podcast, I had a conversation

56:21

with a rider about a year ago who rides

56:23

for one of these teams and asked my opinion

56:25

about it. I said the best

56:28

thing you could probably do is try to

56:30

inform yourself, read as much as possible and

56:33

then see if it alters your

56:35

feeling about riding for this team,

56:38

riding with their name on your

56:40

jersey and then take

56:44

action from there. Of course, as

56:46

I said initially, that presupposes that

56:48

the rider has options to go

56:50

elsewhere. There aren't too many places

56:53

in the world tour at the moment

56:55

where you can go. There isn't

56:57

some sort of whiff of sport

56:59

washing. Do you think the riders think

57:01

about this or do

57:03

you think on the whole

57:06

they try to block this out? Yeah, even

57:08

if they're aware of it, to be honest, I think

57:10

a lot of riders are really just in their own

57:12

world. I think the DS is a bit different. Being

57:15

older and more sort of matured and understand

57:18

what the sponsors sort of entail

57:21

and what they're

57:23

like. Even Mike Woods last year, he was

57:27

even now still, he's really trying to go

57:29

carbon free and make some moves, make some

57:31

big statements and things like that. Just to

57:33

get me a bit more aware of what

57:35

we're doing in the cycling world. It's

57:39

a bit more than the racing and you

57:41

can get super absorbed in just being

57:44

at the top, peak performance and whatever. I

57:46

don't care who's sponsored about it. If that

57:48

is a company, is that? Well, wheelspawn is

57:50

by Orica in GreenEdge. This

57:53

is a massive mining explosives

57:55

company. And for whatever reason,

57:57

they've decided to sponsor GreenEdge.

58:00

up there, I don't know what exactly that was

58:02

all about, but you know you just

58:04

sort of went, you rolled with it, you're like, yeah

58:06

sweet, we got Oricorn and Jersey, you know, but you

58:09

weren't that aware of it as a young guy and

58:11

as you get older you become more aware of what

58:13

the world is and a bit

58:16

more sort of, exactly what you said, just

58:18

becoming a bit more educated about it and

58:20

able to answer questions about it and have

58:22

your own education around it. Look,

58:24

I think I'm going to speak on behalf

58:26

of my mates, you spoke about Sam Bewley

58:28

and General Impy and George Bennett, I know

58:30

these guys are at that point in

58:32

their career and they are certainly more educated about it,

58:34

but the younger guys, I don't know, you know, even

58:37

like a guy like Nick Schiltz, he's a bit younger,

58:39

so, you know, maybe

58:41

they're still in that point in their career, like great, you know,

58:43

I've just got a team and they're paying me and I could

58:45

be out of here in a year's time, so that's

58:48

just sort of how it is. And in

58:50

this particular case, there's the added difficulty

58:52

of the yawning disparity between

58:54

what one side in this war

58:57

is saying and reporting about the

58:59

reality of events

59:01

and what the other side is saying and

59:03

as a sort of humble

59:05

observer sitting in another continent or

59:08

being a professional bike rider, it's

59:10

just really, really difficult to establish what the

59:12

facts are and then to make your decisions on

59:14

the basis of that. You

59:17

still thinking job change in the new year? Yeah, I

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need something that's in high demand and more stable in

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this economy. IT? Yeah, cyber security,

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maybe even AI. That's what I did. Really?

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How? Went to My Computer Career. months.

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A lot of IT pros go to school there too

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to level up. Sweet. Are classes online

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or on campus? Both. Well, I'll check it

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1:00:47

Well chaps we have covered some of the

1:00:49

main stories from the Tour

1:00:51

Down Under, the winner of the race, the

1:00:54

star sprinter of the race. We didn't talk

1:00:56

about his moustache, mitch, looks as though it

1:00:58

could have been inspired by yours. But I

1:01:01

know this is a common look in Australia,

1:01:03

isn't it? More common than in other parts

1:01:05

of the world. Well look Margaret,

1:01:08

look at PODCAST now. He's uh, I was at

1:01:10

the, I was at the sideline, I've got a

1:01:12

funny story for you. I was

1:01:14

at the sideline on stage two finish

1:01:16

of the women's. It was up in, it

1:01:20

was not far from Sterling, or maybe it was

1:01:22

in Sterling. It was up there doing a pub

1:01:24

crawl actually. Shout out to my own life in

1:01:26

the peloton pub crawl. We said you know what

1:01:29

the women's race is finishing down there. Alright let's

1:01:31

go look at it. This guy came up, shaking

1:01:33

my hand. Oh I can't believe I'm seeing you

1:01:35

here. And then like

1:01:38

halfway through the conversation he's like talking about this

1:01:40

gravel event, and he's talking about car racing, and

1:01:42

I'm like, mate, who

1:01:45

is this guy? Who did, who did, I just hit him

1:01:47

and I'm like who do you think I am? He's

1:01:49

like, oh you PODCAST, PODCAST. And I'm like, No

1:01:52

I'm not. Oh I thought, I thought you were

1:01:54

gonna say that that was, that was PODCAST. No

1:01:56

I'm boring with you then. This guy was like,

1:01:58

and then I'm like. If I also been

1:02:01

who you are like I've won on

1:02:03

know on my is like our is

1:02:05

say I'd is a says his back

1:02:07

to fox off and on let's my

1:02:09

he copy made ah was the original

1:02:11

is is walked off he was done

1:02:13

hours of as though and names I

1:02:15

said the mollet in the my it's

1:02:17

coming back strong on reconciles the first

1:02:19

month or want to say one of

1:02:21

the first the Pillows on does a

1:02:23

question to you know about the air

1:02:25

that new aerodynamic summer the Mustafa means

1:02:27

that doesn't possess grid slipstream or something

1:02:29

lower. Does it create an unfair advantage

1:02:32

when you sprint? I said this would

1:02:34

be a study on the originally i'm

1:02:36

gonna come down on the threshold for

1:02:38

an Sos associate of us were would

1:02:40

not have mistresses as well. We Commonwealth

1:02:42

Foods with Code Williams and we're going

1:02:45

to move on. Now to the rider

1:02:47

who was the revelation of the race

1:02:49

states without nineteen year old stage when

1:02:51

a is like than thought all of

1:02:53

us he team Emirates and this felt

1:02:55

like a big moment taps the way

1:02:57

he took his stage when a man.

1:03:00

And we don't often see seized

1:03:02

a sort of a kind of

1:03:04

finishers ah attack in the last

1:03:06

was asked for four kilometers of

1:03:09

i have a his stage so

1:03:11

it it's have demonstrated an unexploded

1:03:13

his speed am and also a

1:03:15

his abilities climbs and miss ride.

1:03:17

I was the winner of the

1:03:20

to Know does of Neil last

1:03:22

year which as we know Ram

1:03:24

has a fantastic record of of

1:03:26

so showcasing the becoming men in

1:03:29

professional cycling set. Up a bit

1:03:31

was already known about these that than

1:03:33

to it off a little bit more

1:03:35

is no now test for we'd discuss

1:03:38

him. I did try to find out

1:03:40

a little bit more about is like

1:03:42

that total from one of his compatriots

1:03:44

some earlier in the week ago. God

1:03:47

way for some the was is a

1:03:49

commentator on cycling see commentator on Cycling

1:03:51

for Colombian Tv cut I call she

1:03:54

lives in the United States. however go

1:03:56

that is Mexican Am often enough for

1:03:58

a number of years. Now it's

1:04:00

ipo! She was ideally placed to tell

1:04:02

us a bit about her compatriots is

1:04:04

and then thought of starting with where

1:04:06

he's from in Mexico for his gaga.

1:04:09

And the not, I support this

1:04:11

down in tears. have no such

1:04:13

a good reputation sometimes. Because.

1:04:16

Of that. You. Know there's bad

1:04:18

commerce and crossing from Mexico to

1:04:20

the U S that in their

1:04:22

last sixteen years we've been ah

1:04:25

a better place to lease. It's

1:04:27

a town that it's browse on

1:04:29

because they are road connecting or

1:04:32

pass through to the United States.

1:04:34

He has its problems and own

1:04:36

because the spy on and sometimes

1:04:39

smaller towns in Mexico and they

1:04:41

are. My little meat chaotic

1:04:43

but the nowadays they are better

1:04:45

than least not a commonplace. To

1:04:47

find an athlete on elite athletes in

1:04:49

this case, Is. It is his

1:04:51

hands and looking at the history

1:04:54

of my skin cyclists in the

1:04:56

ones who have had success the

1:04:58

doesn't seem to be a me

1:05:01

real so geographical Congress Hospital fulcrum

1:05:03

of them sites movement in most

1:05:06

or him up in the sense

1:05:08

that they've come from kind of

1:05:10

everywhere and role as color was

1:05:13

from near Monterrey i think Miguel

1:05:15

auto your was from name is

1:05:17

Mexico city or believe bus is.

1:05:20

There any is there any particular region

1:05:22

where cycling house or a sort of

1:05:24

strong culture and a strong following in

1:05:27

Mexico has the been. Historically it's mostly

1:05:29

in the middle of the country, not

1:05:31

so much in the north. There have

1:05:33

been known some some good. As. Likely

1:05:36

say in the North. They. Are

1:05:38

a song and a good fight.

1:05:40

Most of those are athletes thought to

1:05:42

the united States sold to raise temple

1:05:44

of baddies south. It had fried and

1:05:46

he's doing good in the states armed

1:05:48

that in the eight in the middle

1:05:50

of the country where you can find.

1:05:53

like a huge culture of

1:05:55

around the cycling quarter email

1:05:57

on get a title that

1:06:00

Those states in Mexico, they have

1:06:02

a lot of cyclists. La Scala is

1:06:05

another one. The third town

1:06:07

of Miguel Arroyo. Sometimes you

1:06:09

can find some good athletes

1:06:11

like Jalisco, Michoacan. Those

1:06:13

are more towards the Pacific

1:06:15

side of the country. But

1:06:17

there's no like you would

1:06:19

find in Colombia. There's two regions. And

1:06:22

Mexico, you can find a lot of

1:06:24

places, mostly from the center

1:06:26

part to the north. When I

1:06:29

first heard of Isaac del Toro last year and

1:06:31

he won the Tour de Lavanir, I kind of,

1:06:33

I hoped, Gorgo, that he was going to be

1:06:35

from somewhere, he was going to be born 2,200

1:06:37

meters above sea level. And

1:06:41

then I looked at where he was, where

1:06:43

he was born and it was at zero meters above

1:06:46

sea level. How

1:06:48

long have you known about him and how

1:06:50

surprised have you been? I

1:06:52

found out about the project where

1:06:54

he came from three

1:06:56

years ago, because we in Mexico, we

1:06:58

don't have any federation. As you know,

1:07:01

there's been a little efforts,

1:07:04

but not like big efforts, but

1:07:06

small ones that bring

1:07:08

some of these athletes to have

1:07:11

some kind of schedule,

1:07:13

if you will. But this

1:07:15

sponsor, Eremonex, they decided

1:07:18

to take eight or 10, I

1:07:20

think it was, riders from 14, 15, 16 years

1:07:22

old. And

1:07:25

they took them to Europe, mostly

1:07:27

to race in

1:07:29

Belgium and Italy. They

1:07:32

stay there in San Marino. Isaac

1:07:34

del Toro is the first one that

1:07:36

comes out from this effort, but it's

1:07:39

not as known in Mexico,

1:07:41

because before Isaac, we didn't have any

1:07:43

other examples, recent examples. I know in

1:07:45

Mexico, there's a lot of fun. Fun

1:07:48

for pro cycling, you know, as everybody

1:07:50

else in the world. But right

1:07:53

now, this is making

1:07:55

a commotion, really. I knew

1:07:57

he was good. He has both. The

1:08:00

right height promo for a Mexican.

1:08:02

At least I didn't know how. Songs

1:08:04

isn't as the was and that's what

1:08:07

A has been. Praised me the most

1:08:09

because he's nineteen or twenty and you

1:08:11

know that secretly he can probably do

1:08:14

a lot of things, but mentally is

1:08:16

that they're the most. Impressive.

1:08:19

Thing that can I can say

1:08:21

the he analyzes a lot of

1:08:23

races. He doesn't have any

1:08:25

doubt. He's. Very

1:08:27

proactive. And I think that so

1:08:29

say now and he and that shows.

1:08:32

One he was growing up with these

1:08:34

broads. It. When. He one

1:08:36

who stays in the tour down under

1:08:39

didn't create any kind of splash. all

1:08:41

was the much interest has to be

1:08:43

most interest in the last few days.

1:08:46

And yeah of course I am

1:08:48

still friends with a lot of

1:08:50

journalists and Mexico and they have

1:08:52

forgotten about tagging along time ago,

1:08:54

but I know I know either

1:08:56

has. He has caused a

1:08:58

little ah a commotion because he's

1:09:01

young and we knew about there's

1:09:03

some results from last year so

1:09:05

he was not like out of

1:09:07

that know some some people that

1:09:10

follow cycling they they knew who

1:09:12

he was. Already. Because of.

1:09:14

The. Below Zero and the

1:09:16

villain is it's gonna happen the same

1:09:19

as it happens in Colombia. Sometimes if

1:09:21

you only have. A

1:09:23

good results then you will be

1:09:25

covered very not a huge you

1:09:28

essentially a little bit further from.

1:09:30

This is good for Mexico on the

1:09:33

first example though we haven't a long

1:09:35

time so. Younger younger cyclist

1:09:37

will be. Looking. To

1:09:39

see what can what what can

1:09:41

they do and I have a

1:09:43

morning they are still growing. I

1:09:45

would hope that they understand that

1:09:47

they can become just like time

1:09:49

they or their at the other

1:09:51

things that provided sightings to to

1:09:53

they weren't or of Black veil

1:09:55

her american teams than the. Bring.

1:09:58

Some cyclists to that. Raúl

1:10:01

Alcala was the best Mexican cyclist ever, I

1:10:03

guess most people would agree. He was, he

1:10:05

finished I think in the top 10 of

1:10:07

the tour three times and one stage is

1:10:09

in the tour. How big did

1:10:12

cycling become in Mexico in those years in

1:10:14

the 80s or how much did people follow

1:10:16

him? When I

1:10:18

started doing this thing as

1:10:21

a journalist, he was my inspiration. He

1:10:24

was the pretext that I had with

1:10:26

my my bosses to go cover cycling.

1:10:28

He was an idol in Mexico. We

1:10:31

had a lot of big races in

1:10:33

Mexico in those years in the first

1:10:36

fight of the 90s. He and

1:10:38

Miguel Arroyo that was a little

1:10:40

bit younger, they moved masses. It

1:10:42

was it was incredible. I

1:10:45

remember covering the Ruta Mexico in those

1:10:47

years. They had a lot of support

1:10:49

from the Mexican government and

1:10:51

they had a lot of budget.

1:10:53

So they could bring the biggest

1:10:56

stars of those years. I

1:10:58

remember one of those races

1:11:00

they brought Greg

1:11:02

Lemon, they brought Gianni Buño. There were

1:11:04

some big stars in those years and

1:11:07

I hope I can find some pictures

1:11:09

and I can send it to you.

1:11:11

So you see, but it was massive.

1:11:14

It was just like you see right

1:11:17

now in Colombia. It was great. So,

1:11:19

fellas, a breakout performance from Isaac del

1:11:21

Toro. We see these every now and

1:11:24

again. We've seen more and more of

1:11:26

them over the last few years. The

1:11:28

ages have got younger. Franswaite, you mentioned

1:11:31

earlier on in the podcast

1:11:33

this sort of trend of teams

1:11:36

looking for younger and younger riders. I

1:11:39

had a look a

1:11:41

few days ago after del Toro's

1:11:43

stage win at the number of

1:11:46

riders aged under 23. Who

1:11:49

have won world tour

1:11:51

races or top level world tour and HC

1:11:53

races in every season since about the year

1:11:55

2000. If You go back to

1:11:57

seasons like the year 2000, there was the one. Maybe

1:12:00

mean nothing to one or two

1:12:02

riders same year two thousand I'm

1:12:05

under the age of twenty three.

1:12:07

One World Tour or H C

1:12:09

races if you look at the

1:12:11

last couple of years to be

1:12:14

average is around twenty two or

1:12:16

three riders. Are under. The

1:12:18

age of twenty three per year winning

1:12:20

World tour and eight see racists and

1:12:22

but it did made me think as

1:12:24

we can probably all remember than some

1:12:26

of the name some of these performs

1:12:29

as we've seen Ruff is when you're

1:12:31

young good, some journalists a younger observer

1:12:33

of the school. These performances have a

1:12:35

bigger impact and youths to have a

1:12:37

tendency to extrapolate even more so extravagantly

1:12:39

On and think that's you know this

1:12:41

twenty year old, this one this stage

1:12:43

of it while the best has is

1:12:45

gonna win fifteen towards the France and.

1:12:47

Then with a bit of age and

1:12:50

experience you realize that's that's that's not

1:12:52

what with how it pans up. I

1:12:54

remembered a few am from Swarm and

1:12:57

but when Thomas love Chris to a

1:12:59

twenty year old Thomas love Chris the

1:13:01

Swedish right of One, the Sec Law

1:13:04

south and two thousand and Four and

1:13:06

that seemed like ah, a sort of

1:13:08

a seismic moments that sports am I

1:13:11

remember Russian right? I'm Michelle ignite chef

1:13:13

in right putting call for a raise

1:13:15

of young. Think of team two thousand.

1:13:18

Seven winning of anyone Like when

1:13:20

the on stage with towards the

1:13:22

med I'm in spectacular fashion and

1:13:24

everyone's had tipping him for multiple

1:13:26

grandpa victories these arises he never

1:13:28

got anywhere near or Grenfell victory

1:13:30

and we hope that things are

1:13:33

different for his i've been photo

1:13:35

but can you chaps member of

1:13:37

any sort of and performances and

1:13:39

very young riders they're really strict

1:13:41

year and cause you to projects

1:13:43

prognosticate. Fantastic! Successful than well.

1:13:45

Miguel Indurain suffer because it's sheath coded

1:13:48

security cellular the delivery nice side more

1:13:50

you in the to the voters when

1:13:52

he was like very young it's another

1:13:54

this and thus hulu disguise great and

1:13:56

and and fuzzy and well he went

1:13:58

to to do. The mix things in

1:14:01

the future but only remember because you know

1:14:03

a new know all about the about a

1:14:05

million alright I remember bill nighy know stood

1:14:07

the word sumption of that predictions you know

1:14:09

are saying that the or week was when

1:14:11

seven to the front and center at and

1:14:14

of the thing is we do it's it's

1:14:16

it's kind of goes up and them but

1:14:18

there was these least tradition or even me

1:14:20

i was i was you know that was

1:14:22

did these common sense that was signed the

1:14:24

deets did the do the good do the

1:14:27

right age to win a grand tour for

1:14:29

instance with twenty. Seven than that That's that's

1:14:31

the even that What When I was a

1:14:33

runner and when I was New Earth the

1:14:35

sportscar. It's earth that the coaches were also

1:14:37

in the all you the A huge when

1:14:39

you reach twenty seven deaths the age when

1:14:42

you know you get you get to you

1:14:44

to pick the is byte about figures for

1:14:46

so I think is a graphic i'm pro

1:14:48

cycling started you look at that business at

1:14:50

a bell curve. A quite clear that Twenty

1:14:52

Seven is the magic age of in terms

1:14:54

of use your points. Here is even promising

1:14:56

young riders in up up to a in

1:14:59

a ten years ago. The word when they're

1:15:01

first grand tour still though the an old

1:15:03

to the say not done go too far

1:15:05

don't have a duty than they were like

1:15:07

indoor and is a is a is that

1:15:09

it is a case like he knows he

1:15:11

did you first couple of to the France

1:15:13

one stage and didn't do much else because

1:15:15

the team said though style with with on

1:15:17

the money's do that and then comes Bernard

1:15:19

comes, pockets are and and everything changes but

1:15:21

that's just remember with when concern I once

1:15:23

thought it's a shiny was pretty young be

1:15:25

said always going to in other than than

1:15:27

many tools and then we said the same

1:15:29

with Bernard's. And thus and with pockets or

1:15:32

with with with a noise position has been

1:15:34

to any more grand tours where we would

1:15:36

hope he will he does but that that

1:15:38

idea that because you win at a very

1:15:40

young age have been to win seven or

1:15:42

eight even for the great guys is not

1:15:44

confirm my summons and and then also to

1:15:47

put things back into perspective the greats of

1:15:49

the great slice or copy one is from

1:15:51

to reduce your twenties so it's It's not

1:15:53

like it's really new stuff the what's new

1:15:55

is the amounts of young guys coming up

1:15:57

every year you have the impression that. Every

1:16:00

total half-year winner is going to win the Tour de France,

1:16:02

but if that's the case, we'll have a different Tour de

1:16:04

France winner every year. The

1:16:07

funny thing is, I was trying to think of

1:16:09

some just them, but the funny thing is you

1:16:11

don't remember them because they don't become champions. You

1:16:13

know what I mean? I'm like, who

1:16:16

are those guys? I'm trying to remember myself now,

1:16:18

but they don't come to mind straight away. Mitch,

1:16:21

have you ever been to a training camp

1:16:23

where you're just merely at a training camp

1:16:25

on the basis of the first group race

1:16:27

that they've done in a team you've thought

1:16:29

this guy is? Well, Michael

1:16:31

Storra. Michael Storra is, and he is still

1:16:33

a very big talent, and

1:16:36

even Lucas Hamilton. These

1:16:39

guys within the Australian realms were sort of in

1:16:41

that they came to the Green Edge training camp

1:16:43

as under 23s, and they were... And

1:16:47

Jai Hinley, to a degree, was sort of, I

1:16:49

wouldn't say behind them, but not as sort of

1:16:53

predicted as to do as much.

1:16:55

These guys are, and

1:16:57

still are, very big

1:17:00

talents, but they just for whatever reason

1:17:02

haven't gone on, and Jai, on the

1:17:04

other hand, has. So they're

1:17:07

two just straight off hand. I remember coming

1:17:09

in and Storra, even Roommas Storra, and his

1:17:11

numbers are incredible, and he was all over

1:17:13

it, and I was just like, well, this

1:17:15

guy's going to do something crazy. He has

1:17:17

done some great stuff, but maybe not what

1:17:20

I initially thought. And even, I think, Lucas

1:17:22

Hamilton as well. He could do so much

1:17:24

more, but there's so many other

1:17:26

elements, isn't there? Yeah, it's going to be really

1:17:28

interesting to watch Del Toro. It's going

1:17:30

to be interesting to see what kind of

1:17:32

rider he develops into, because as I said

1:17:34

in Down Under, he showcased a couple of

1:17:36

different abilities. Pogacharesque, in his sort of style,

1:17:38

the sort of narrow bars, very sort of

1:17:40

dynamic looking climbing style when

1:17:42

he was out of the saddle. Just

1:17:45

looking at the Tour de Lavinia

1:17:47

last year, he lost a lot of

1:17:49

time. He was riding for a Mexican team. They

1:17:51

lost a lot of time in the

1:17:53

team time trial, two minutes, and gained

1:17:55

it back in the high mountains. But

1:17:57

he was only third on a very...

1:18:00

difficult mountain time trial, 11km

1:18:02

to the 8% and the winner

1:18:04

of that was Matthew Ricitello who's

1:18:06

riding for Israel and yeah

1:18:09

there's been a little bit of hype about him,

1:18:11

there's been sort of interest in his performances but

1:18:13

no one's really talking about him as the next

1:18:15

you know multiple Tour de France winner. Del

1:18:17

Torre is living in San Marino chaps

1:18:19

and one of his

1:18:21

mentors thus far has been Piotr Gourmov,

1:18:25

a very good climber in his day

1:18:28

in the early 90s that you will

1:18:30

know Francois and also Goga in the

1:18:32

audio clip we heard there mentioned Raul

1:18:35

Alcala who you will also have covered

1:18:37

Francois. Yeah, I remember Raul

1:18:39

Alcala pretty well because he

1:18:41

was seen well he was

1:18:43

with PGM of dubious

1:18:45

fame at the time and it's true

1:18:48

that when Raul Alcala started to win

1:18:50

races and be impressive even in the

1:18:52

Tour de France and you know performing

1:18:54

well in time trials when he was seen as a

1:18:57

climber in the first place, there were a

1:18:59

little bit of doubts about his performances and

1:19:01

performances of others in the team at the

1:19:03

time. The interesting thing I think about Del

1:19:05

Toro and the kind of

1:19:08

young riders we see emerging is that

1:19:10

they're all runners. I mean they used

1:19:12

to be you're so great climbers emerged

1:19:14

and you're so great sprinters emerged but

1:19:16

these days these young guys who win

1:19:19

the Tour de France and perform

1:19:21

straight away on the world tour, they

1:19:24

seem to be track of all trades,

1:19:26

they seem to be able to do anything.

1:19:28

That's what makes them even a poor parker,

1:19:30

all these guys. If you have any impression

1:19:32

they can win classics, they can win grand

1:19:34

tours, they're not specialists anymore and there's kind

1:19:36

of a new bridge of riders

1:19:38

coming up. They are far more versatile

1:19:40

than they used to be and that's

1:19:42

what's interesting in my opinion. Perhaps

1:19:45

we are going to conclude

1:19:47

today's episode by talking

1:19:49

about something else we're going to pivot away from Tour

1:19:52

de France under just briefly to

1:19:54

talk about one team that

1:19:57

was out down under competing at Tour

1:19:59

de France under. Can pretty well with

1:20:01

the Ecuadorian right I Johnson modify

1:20:03

it has been a lot of

1:20:05

thought this winter about in he

1:20:07

asked granted the is on about

1:20:09

how they are going to pivot

1:20:11

own need to pivot income yes

1:20:13

and no. Ward were few reports

1:20:16

this week pointing out that Dave

1:20:18

Brailsford and has now officially formerly

1:20:20

moved away from the team in

1:20:22

the sense that he is no

1:20:24

longer team principal, he's now Director

1:20:26

of Sports Him he asked any

1:20:28

us as we know are. About

1:20:30

to takeover. While a quarter

1:20:32

of Manchester United football team,

1:20:34

Brailsford hasn't been replaced in

1:20:36

the sense that some any Us

1:20:39

Grenadier don't have a team principal

1:20:41

now, however, there been various

1:20:43

additions. Ah, I'm As a

1:20:45

bit of a reshuffle, they

1:20:47

have a new Ceo coach,

1:20:49

John Allen Mitch. He's one of

1:20:51

your countrymen. He's a stray Lynn.

1:20:54

He first got involved in cycling

1:20:56

with Bar A when it was

1:20:59

Bahrain's Mclaren Amazon. He's going to

1:21:01

be Ceo of in Ios granted

1:21:03

the as hung yesterday know cause

1:21:05

Tuesday he spoke to me on

1:21:07

a few other members of the

1:21:09

media about how he sees teams

1:21:11

short term, medium, some long term

1:21:13

future and also what browses row

1:21:15

is gonna be that to hear

1:21:17

a little bit of that now

1:21:19

states the godfathers his team founder

1:21:21

of the team. It's actually a

1:21:23

privilege that we still have him

1:21:25

accessible to the team. Is

1:21:27

Raleigh's as director of any sport and

1:21:29

say he clearly has responsibility across a

1:21:32

variety of different sports performance of all

1:21:34

of them not to cycling but it

1:21:36

speaks highly of the performance as particular

1:21:38

team that the person in responsibility for

1:21:41

performance across that very impressive group of

1:21:43

other sports teams as comes from cycling

1:21:45

background on I think that's actually it

1:21:47

still should ask to be proud of

1:21:50

that. You know if now got somebody

1:21:52

from from our world world of Cycling

1:21:54

involved in what is one of the

1:21:56

most famous. Football seems of the world announcing.

1:21:59

That says a lot. about what cycling has been able

1:22:01

to do over the last 10 or 15 years. Our

1:22:03

routes play an important part in this,

1:22:06

but we are a performance first GC

1:22:08

team that is looking to innovate and

1:22:10

be at the zenith of this sport.

1:22:12

That's always been the case. I

1:22:15

think sometimes people mistakenly think that

1:22:18

we've had a diffusion of focus,

1:22:20

but that's always been the

1:22:22

DNA of the team. That's continued from our

1:22:24

previous owners into the E-neos ownership, and the

1:22:26

ambition is the same. So with that comes

1:22:29

an identity that I think certainly to those

1:22:31

inside the team is crystal clear. And

1:22:33

that is that we're a GC team first

1:22:36

and foremost, and want to be on the top step

1:22:38

of the podium. That's it. What you

1:22:40

may not realize is that cycling

1:22:42

as a sport and as a

1:22:44

pastime is one that is very

1:22:46

important to E-neos as a culture.

1:22:48

It's very important to the three

1:22:50

owners of E-neos. They're all keen

1:22:52

cyclists. They're very engaged in the sport. They're very

1:22:54

engaged in what we do. I wouldn't say that

1:22:57

any one of the three of them is more

1:22:59

engaged than the others. I was

1:23:01

with the owners last week with Dave

1:23:03

and Jean-Claude. Their ability to stay across

1:23:05

all of the different sports teams and

1:23:08

indeed all of their businesses is extraordinary.

1:23:11

It's a privilege to have an audience with people

1:23:14

like that who have such proven track records

1:23:16

of performance across all walks of life, and

1:23:18

we're very lucky to have them as owners.

1:23:21

There is no question of E-neos'

1:23:23

commitment to cycling. There is no

1:23:25

time horizon put on that commitment.

1:23:27

E-neos has a great track record

1:23:29

of acquiring companies and sports teams

1:23:32

and generating value and holding onto

1:23:34

those companies and sports teams in

1:23:36

the long term. That's it. Well

1:23:39

chaps, gonna have some hot takes from you guys

1:23:41

on E-neos, what they need to do, what they

1:23:43

will do in a second. We

1:23:46

heard from John Allat there. Scott

1:23:48

Draw is the other kind of performance

1:23:51

director who's come in there who I think

1:23:53

is gonna be a key figure, but just

1:23:55

listening to him yesterday, chaps didn't give too

1:23:57

much away, John, but. he

1:24:00

talked there about Brailsford and Brailsford's role,

1:24:02

the sort of spectre of Brailsford, how

1:24:05

much it is going to loom over the team. I

1:24:08

would put it to you that that is

1:24:10

pretty key going forward because we all know

1:24:12

that, for example, Rod Ellingworth left the team,

1:24:14

resigned from the team a couple

1:24:16

of months ago. I think if

1:24:18

you were to wind the clock back a year ago and

1:24:21

ask anyone at INEOS what Dave Brailsford's influence and

1:24:23

role were going to be in 2023, they

1:24:26

would have told you one thing and

1:24:29

what the reality was over the next

1:24:31

few months was quite different. I think

1:24:33

there were periods where they thought he

1:24:35

was going to be more involved than

1:24:37

he was and then there

1:24:39

was a moment at

1:24:41

the Tour de France when he arrived at the

1:24:43

Tour de France and visited the team and looked

1:24:46

at what their transfer plans were when he was

1:24:48

a bit more involved than they maybe would have

1:24:50

wanted and would have liked. And

1:24:53

as I said, they can have that idea for how things

1:24:55

are going to work but that

1:24:57

needs to be the reality, I

1:24:59

would suggest. Mitch, what do you

1:25:01

think? Just slightly away from

1:25:04

that but there's a massive loss of identity

1:25:06

with that team. For so

1:25:08

long there, it was just a team to

1:25:10

follow. It was a team that had the goals, that

1:25:12

had the dream to live that sort of British

1:25:14

dream to take the Tour and everything

1:25:16

else wrapped around with it, with Cav there and we

1:25:19

all know the story, I don't need to repeat it.

1:25:22

But a massive loss of identity in the

1:25:24

last few years and that massive exodus of

1:25:26

those key British

1:25:28

writers that came through the system, Theo Gagenhart,

1:25:30

it was a bit of a surprise for

1:25:33

me to see him step away and just

1:25:36

to see that change.

1:25:38

It made me understand that behind

1:25:40

the covers, things weren't right there and

1:25:43

you've just exposed that clearly there.

1:25:46

And Aussie could be the fix. I

1:25:48

won't doubt that, that's for sure. But that is

1:25:51

something that needs to happen, not only for Ineos

1:25:53

but for, I think for cycling, I don't want

1:25:55

to say it like a romantic here, but it'd

1:25:57

be great. You've got to have them back. where

1:26:00

they were back at the Grand Tour is sort of

1:26:02

challenging things. There's been the last couple of

1:26:05

years, we need that extra sort of push

1:26:07

again from Inyos to

1:26:10

push the two top at the moment,

1:26:12

Yumbo and UIE. They still

1:26:14

got an impressive squad if you look at who

1:26:16

they got with

1:26:19

Peacock, Carlos Rodriguez and

1:26:21

a few others. But as

1:26:23

Mitch said, the loss of identity

1:26:25

I think is a big blow.

1:26:28

It started with a commando spirit,

1:26:30

we'd go for it in five years, we went

1:26:32

to Tour de France, nobody believed it, they did

1:26:34

that. And then after a while,

1:26:36

it's only logical that you have an

1:26:38

anti-climax, a kind of a hangover. But

1:26:40

there is one strange phenomenon that I

1:26:42

can't really explain, but it's not only

1:26:45

with cycling, but sports teams in general,

1:26:47

sometimes embodied by someone.

1:26:49

Like Quickstep is Patrick

1:26:51

Lefebvre, we were discussing total

1:26:53

energy, Jean-Rene Bernaud, Guptama

1:26:57

F.T.J., Marc Magdio. I mean, you

1:26:59

always link the movie star, Xavier

1:27:01

Unsui, and then he took over

1:27:03

from, that he was there from

1:27:05

the start. When you lose like

1:27:07

the father image that Braceford was,

1:27:10

sometimes you have the impression the

1:27:12

team loses itself and it doesn't

1:27:14

know where it's going, the goals

1:27:16

get far less clear

1:27:18

than they used to be. I think

1:27:20

that's what's been happening with Inyos. We

1:27:22

were mentioning the Tour Down Under, Stephen

1:27:25

Williams, Oscar Amli. In these team Sky

1:27:27

days, these guys would have been with

1:27:30

team Sky. You were a British rider, there

1:27:32

was no other choice, and there

1:27:34

were no other options. And now it's

1:27:37

great that British cycling has new strengths

1:27:40

and new up and

1:27:42

coming riders, but how come that

1:27:44

these guys are not with Inyos? They would

1:27:46

have been in the past. I think, yeah,

1:27:48

there's a little bit of a lack of

1:27:50

focus, a lack of identity, as you said,

1:27:53

because managers and DSCs have been coming and

1:27:55

going. I don't exactly know what the solution

1:27:57

is. You mentioned the

1:27:59

new CEO. They've got a new guy

1:28:01

as well. I don't know exactly what his

1:28:03

role is because I mean that you've got all

1:28:05

these names coming up But you can't tell what

1:28:08

they're doing. But the Jean-Claude Blanc is up

1:28:10

there somewhere in the you know

1:28:12

in the hierarchy He's sort of on the Brailsford

1:28:14

level. I think he He

1:28:16

is well, he'll be very involved with Manchester

1:28:18

United as the expectation I think a lot

1:28:20

less involved with the Viking team They have

1:28:22

got this grand vision and this goes back

1:28:24

to when Jim Radcliffe took over the team

1:28:27

in the US 2.0 If

1:28:29

Team Sky 1.0 was about sort

1:28:31

of marginal gains Which became this kind of catchphrase

1:28:34

which I think perhaps a regretted

1:28:37

using but in the in your

1:28:40

2.0 or Team Sky 2.0 was going to

1:28:42

be about this kind of cross pollination of

1:28:44

different Expertise in different sports and you know

1:28:46

you speak to people in the organization and

1:28:49

they say that has been Really

1:28:51

successful. I mean well from their point of view

1:28:53

they found it really really useful The

1:28:56

input from sailing I think they had

1:28:58

members of the INEOS coaching staff

1:29:00

were in the dressing room for the

1:29:02

all-blacks World Cup semi-final

1:29:05

and they've taken a lot from that but

1:29:08

they're a team that needs to want to

1:29:10

win the Tour de France and The

1:29:13

issue is that they don't currently have anyone who

1:29:15

looks as though they're going to be able to

1:29:17

win Tour de France soon There was a lot

1:29:19

of speculation about Remco, Avonapol in the winter I've

1:29:21

been told on Good Authority that they tried very

1:29:23

hard to get Remco especially with his low wages

1:29:26

You know as we learned from like a zeta

1:29:30

They tried very hard and they reached

1:29:33

the roadblock with that interestingly They also

1:29:35

tried to get Primoz

1:29:37

Roglic the conversations about Roglic

1:29:40

with a view to recruiting Roglic they

1:29:43

sort of stopped around about the

1:29:45

time when I mentioned Brailsford coming

1:29:47

to the Tour and The

1:29:49

team pivoting on a few riders. We've talked

1:29:51

about this in recent weeks Carlos

1:29:54

Verona is the name that was the case that

1:29:56

most listeners will be familiar with they decided they

1:29:58

were going to sign him then they They

1:30:00

told him and his agent that they changed their

1:30:02

mind and this was the point

1:30:05

at which the Roglic conversation sort of

1:30:07

stopped as well There was a lot

1:30:09

of talk amongst of agents in that

1:30:11

period that kind of Ineos and their

1:30:13

plans their vision Couldn't be

1:30:15

trusted. There seemed to be this

1:30:17

sort of indecision whether Roglic's agent

1:30:20

Decided well, that was why

1:30:23

it was a better idea to go to Borahanskraut

1:30:25

or not But in terms of the timing sort

1:30:27

of coincidence of the two things they certainly matched

1:30:29

up Yeah, I still think that when

1:30:31

you need stability even in a company, you

1:30:33

know Like we talk about company culture Well

1:30:36

when you you kind of lose Brightsford because

1:30:38

he's everywhere but nowhere in the same time

1:30:40

You know when you lose Rod Ellingworth when

1:30:42

you lose Shane Sutton for the reasons we

1:30:44

know when you lose Fran Miller I mean

1:30:46

all those core people in Team

1:30:50

Sky of the beginning what's left

1:30:52

of the team culture and the

1:30:54

team tradition and I'm convinced it

1:30:56

leaves The riders a

1:30:58

little bit out of focus is the same with

1:31:00

football for reasons unknown to I

1:31:03

could assist statistics or figures teams with

1:31:05

a history of winning a Competition

1:31:07

are better on the day than teams

1:31:09

with the you know more money more

1:31:11

guys But without the culture of the

1:31:13

of the of the sport of the

1:31:15

race and then team in the also

1:31:19

I'm sure would benefit from keeping a little

1:31:21

bit of a tradition going otherwise they might

1:31:23

lose themselves on the same No, what happens

1:31:25

to a team a bit closer to me?

1:31:27

What happens to a team like EF? Education,

1:31:30

you know without Jonathan Vaughters, you know on

1:31:32

a different sort of note that team That's

1:31:34

got a completely reliant on sort of culture

1:31:37

and without Jonathan Vaughters I wonder what that team

1:31:39

would really be you know, say what you will

1:31:41

about JV You know

1:31:43

and personally, you know, there were the up-and-down

1:31:45

moments within working with him, but he's created

1:31:47

this Unique culture there without

1:31:49

him does where is that team? I don't

1:31:52

know. Yeah, there aren't too

1:31:54

many examples I can think of Mitch where teams

1:31:56

have successfully

1:31:59

reinvented themselves or rediscovered another

1:32:01

emblematic, a new emblematic figure and

1:32:03

sort of changed the identity of

1:32:06

their project. I mean, you know,

1:32:08

you could talk about to Rababank

1:32:10

becoming Yumba-visma but I don't think

1:32:12

any of us really think that is the same team.

1:32:15

No. And that's a really

1:32:17

good example. Both absolutely right on that and

1:32:20

the Vortis example is a good one, I would suggest.

1:32:22

You know, Group Homile without

1:32:24

Madiou. I know Yvonne Madiou has retired

1:32:26

this year but Mark is still very

1:32:28

much in situ. Well, for us all

1:32:30

right, it's about time, it's still breakfast

1:32:32

time in Marseille so you'll probably be

1:32:34

wanting to go out and get

1:32:37

yourself a world championship winning

1:32:40

baguette. I hate baguette, I've always

1:32:42

hated baguette so no, no way,

1:32:44

no baguettes for me. Baguettes

1:32:47

generally are just the devil's bread, aren't they?

1:32:50

Just rip the top off your mouth and

1:32:53

they're not really good on any particular

1:32:55

score. They're good within the

1:32:57

hour after they were baked

1:33:00

but if you buy them a couple of

1:33:02

hours later or the next day, forget it,

1:33:04

absolute crap. They're

1:33:07

good for sort of saving off intruders

1:33:09

for your home. They're useful as

1:33:12

weapons but that's about it.

1:33:14

It's bedtime as he

1:33:16

rubs his eyes and looks like

1:33:18

he's had a hard week. I'm going to get some

1:33:21

dinner, yes, some very late dinner but the tennis is

1:33:23

on here so it's Australian

1:33:25

Open so there will be a game kicking off in

1:33:27

a minute and I'm going to go enjoy another

1:33:30

cold beer as you guys have seen and

1:33:33

some dinner but great chatting with you guys.

1:33:36

No dry January from its docker. He's earned a beer,

1:33:38

he's earned a beer after the week he's had. Chaps,

1:33:40

it's been a delight as always, we'll be hearing

1:33:42

from both of you in the coming weeks I'm

1:33:44

sure. Thank you very much. The

1:33:50

second broadcast was created in

1:33:52

2013 by Richard Moore, Daniel Freed

1:33:54

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