8 Biggest Lessons of 'Le Tour' So Far...

This episode of the Get Fast podcast is brought to you by Tribalo Coaching, where we help triathletes and cyclists like you train smarter to race faster. You are joined, as always, every episode by your host. We've got former Australian Ironman champion Jarrett Donnelly. And I'm Jordan Donnelly. In this episode, we are touching on pretty much everything to do with the Tour de France. It's been another exciting week. We can't wait to touch on any everything we've learned throughout the week, everything we've been watching and everything we've been paying attention to. So we're pretty much just going to launch straight into it because last week we spoke about the start of the Tour de France and race tactics and how it applies. And there is just so much to love and learn and watch and discuss about this epic race, and it applies to both cyclists and triathletes, like we'll discuss in the episode. So, Dad, I pretty much want to launch straight into it and say, what have you learned the last week? What have you been paying attention to with regards to the Tour de France?

The main thing that I, I'm really a keen follower of Mitchelton Scott and I love Matt White. I love the way he goes about things. I reckon he's one of the best directors in the game. And they made it clear, Mitchelton Scott, that they were there purely for stage wins, stage victories. They didn't think they had a contender. And. And so what stands out in my mind is the ability for him to change his plan when, when they got handed the yellow jersey because of the Alaphilippe time penalty for taking a drink outside the 20 kilometer feed zone. That was. That's not the way you want to get a yellow jersey, but of course, you've got yellow jersey, you know, whether you wanted it or not. And then they were able to hold that yellow jersey for four days. And nearly, nearly the. You know, this two days in the Pyrenees is always going to test Yates to see where he was at. But what stands out in my mind is the guy leading the team, his ability to come up with another race strategy based around the circumstances that are occurring in front of him at that moment each day. And we always talk about having a goal and a plan and trying to execute it, but in the middle of that race, things will happen. And I'm not just talking about the Tour de France. I'm talking about. I'm talking about a state road title or national road title race. You've got to be able to react to things that Happen and have some other plans in place to go, alright, this is not how I planned was going to happen. I'm now going with plan B and you know, thinking on your feet. And that's something that Matt White is, he's a winner at. And that really stands out in my mind. And it's only early days. We're only, you know, only one week into the Tour and boy, who would have thought that so much could have happened in one week. It's just been incredible.

Yeah. And there is a lot to talk about just before we move on. I say it every week at the moment, but we are still in the coronavirus period. And that means that we are having to record this podcast from separate locations. And so as we're recording this for me, the audio is breaking up a little bit. Usually on the recording it turns out okay. So I hope it does. But if it doesn't, you can understand why just touching on that flexibility. I mean, it's something you always say. Like you said, you know, you need to be flexible and you can go in with a plan, but you need to be able to adjust. And that's a lot more specific in cycling racing than triathlon racing. But things pop up. Even in triathlon, things can come up that are unexpected. And we had an athlete in our training program actually do a swim test a few months ago where they swallowed a bunch of water and it really threw them off for the rest of the race and it really stuffed up their timing and something like that. It was a good lesson for them to. It can easily throw you off and you choke a little bit on water. It's just something you don't plan for in a race. But something so small when it happens, you need to be able to adjust and say, okay, well maybe I'm choking here. I'm not going to average the exact same pace. So don't ask that of yourself and adjust your expectations of the pace you're going to hold for the last 500 of the swim and go from there.

Yeah, there's so many examples in any sport where just the predictable things going to happen. And if you haven't had a. If you haven't properly thought about these things and example would be, you know, the battery goes flat on your power meter. So you know, you haven't changed the battery before the race and all of a sudden you're trying to do a time trial for 180k with no power. You've trained the whole season around this one race. You know, that's an example of what am I going to do? What's my plan? Of course, there's other things we can use, such as average speed, but that's only good if there's no wind on the day and the course is out and back. You know, there's so many variables. You know, heart rate you can use, you know, perceived exertion. But these are things that you should have thought about. You know, if I get a puncture in the race, you know, how am I going to deal with that? So there's so many things that can happen that you have to have flexibility with. It's great to have a structured race strategy and then, you know, go out with the expectation that you can execute it. But at the end of the day, that's a great day if nothing else goes wrong and you can actually execute the plan you started with. So this is, you know, the Tour de France is a three week event where that many things can go wrong at the last minute. You know, we talk about it later, but there's so many examples of people thinking they're in a position and all of a sudden they're in a completely different position now because of what just happened.

Yeah, this is a good segue to talk about last night's stage. I mean, we're going to cover a lot of the stages because so much has happened that we do want to touch on. But last night's stage, specifically stage nine, Hershey found himself in the lead again. We saw him in stage two or three and we spoke about last podcast where he was sprinting with Yates and Alaphilippe and he just missed out. And he was bitterly disappointed to come second by a couple of inches to Alaphilippe. And unfortunately, last night the same thing happened. He was in the breakaway the whole day. He rode an unbelievable race and he just got mowed down at the end and he stuffed up his sprint and came third. And I haven't seen many riders as disappointed as him in the post interview for a while, he really, he could barely talk, he was so disappointed. And that brings up a good point that, you know, he's doing his best and he is young, but he, and he, it's kind of in line with that flexibility of. Well, he has to keep, keep his head high and adjust from here and keep going for stage wins and learn from it.

Yeah. And look, we talked about Cadell, Cadell, Caleb Ewan, Cadell Evans on my mind here for some reason, Caleb Ewan, Stage one, where his primary goal was to win that stage and take yellow, that Was his whole focus for weeks going into that tour. Stage one is a sprinter stage. I have got one and maybe my only ever chance to win the yellow jersey. And how disappointed was he when he just stuffed up his sprint. But two days later he came out and won that bunch sprint and off he went. You know, he's now got, you know, his fourth Tour de France stage. Tour it could be one of 10 or 15 in the future. And for Hershey it's the same. You know, he had an opportunity against Yates alaPhilippe in that three way stage that those three were sprinting for the final. And we talked about his sprint, how he stuffed that up and you know, with another meter he possibly was going to beat Alaphilippe. And you know, yet we have another scenario where he's the best rider on the day and yet he comes up, you know, third or it doesn't really matter if you're not first, you know where.

Second. His position?

Yeah, second, third, fifth. It's great to be in the top 10. So what? But you know, he deserved to win that race. And that's bike racing. It's just the way it is. It pans out with so many unexpected things and it just, you know, had he timed his sprint better and we've talked about this twice now in two stages, he's really stuffed his sprint up. Last time he went to with Alaphilippe he went too late and guess what? He overcompensates and goes too soon. So guess what's gonna happen next time? He'll get it right and he'll win. And mark my words, he will win lots of stages. He is a force to be reckoned with. He's a talent for what he did last night. Solo was incredible. And you know, it's like an apprenticeship. You have to have lots of mistakes before you learn to win. And the example I would use is a lot of the guys who come to the coaching program probably are good enough to ride. You know, some of them are probably mediocre riders. They might be a C grade club rider or B grade and they're possibly good enough to ride at the back of A grade and they want to just ride in A grade. But I won't let that happen. I will make them ride C grade so they learn how to win the race rather than going into A grade and just hanging on and being a spectator. You want to be a part of the race where you're learning how to beat people. And in C grade there's really good sit on sprinters who you'll have a hard time beating because they've been doing that for years in C grade. They just sit in, do no work and then whip you at the end. And, you know, you might have been the strongest rider in the race and yet you can't win seed rate yet. You could probably hang on with a grade. So that's an example of what I'm talking about. You have to actually learn how to win before you become the next Sagan or.

Cancellara or.

Yeah, Cancellara. Or, you know, some of the legends of the sport. You know, they, you know, as we've said many times, Sagan's had as many seconds and thirds as he has victories. And you know, we saw him the other day in the stage into the wind where Bora Hansgrohe went to the front and just made a fantastic race of the tour. It just was one of the all time great stages and it was a repeat of the season before where it was almost the same stage, you know, the crosswind. And they just attacked from kilometre one and everything they'd done everything perfect except the last hundred meters. Sagan, he changed his line off. Van Aert probably got bumped a little bit and his chain, something happened and he couldn't sprint. Yeah, all that work that they successfully done, all they had to do was finish it off. And yet, you know, that happens to the best people. So you've got a cop it sweet and not drop your head and live to fight another day. And there's so many examples of this happening. So if it happens to you, you've got two choices. Every time do I go and sulk in the corner and say, oh, woe is me, and feel sorry for myself? Well, you should do that for a second or two, definitely. But that should burn in your stomach, the fire to say, I'm not going to let that happen again. And I can't wait for the next race so I can rectify the misguided, the misdoings or the wrongdoings that, you know, the universe placed on me. I deserve to win that and I'm just going to prove it the next race. That's how I think about it. And it's just for me, it's like, oh, I can't wait for the next race. That's just not going to happen again. That, you know, I'm, you know, it's almost like when I expect to win, it's more pressure because people think you're going to win, but when you lose, I just can't wait for the next race, because the pressure's off me now. I'm just going for it. And, you know, I'm so motivated by a mistake or an error or an unfortunate outcome. It motivates me so much more to. I'm not thinking about, you know, feeling sorry for myself. I'm thinking about how am I going to make sure next time that doesn't not happen again. So, yeah, there's so many examples that are happening now in the Tour. We can go every stage is, you know, Thibaut Pino. Oh, my God, what is going on with his mental state? You know, as a professional cyclist, he can see his mind is all over the place. You know, Fabio Aru riding at the back of the peloton. You know, there's just so many.

It's hard for all these riders because we actually don't know what's happened with their coronavirus, period. You know, they could have had a horrible preparation. They just might be completely underdone, and that's why they're at the back, or they're psychologically not there, and that's why they're at the back. It's hard to judge, actually. That's why it's a bit of a weird race.

Yeah. But all these really talented riders are dealing with it differently. That's the point I'm trying to get is, you know, you can be dealt a really harsh hand, whether you were able to train or not or whatever your preparation was, or whether you were sick or injured or you've had a crash, you know, and it's just how you react is. Is what I'm interested and intrigued with when I watch these races of professionals, and it's their job, you know, and, you know, at some point in time, you need to take responsibility all the time for your preparation and for your actions in race. And if you go into a race where you know in your own mind that you're not prepared, well, then I'm questioning, why did you go in that race? You know, you should be weighing up all those things. And we have lots of examples of people who've been injured or sick and still going into a race because they've paid for the accommodation and the airfare, and they're going to have a shocking outcome. But the other factors are overriding. The most important factor is never going into a race under prepared.

Yeah. So you could say the same thing about Pino, is that if he was that under prepared, that he's getting spat out the back so badly and he's losing 20 minutes when he's supposed to be a GC favourite. Maybe he shouldn't be in the race.

Yes. And look, you know, don't forget last year, the camera's on him when he was going up another climb. I'm sure it was a Tourmalet. And the camera was on him with his FDJ guy, with his arm around him, saying, oh, you know, and he got in the car, you know, it's not like it didn't happen just once. I've seen it two seasons in a row. An unbelievably talented writer when he's on his day, you know, but then there's other days. And look, I'm trying not to be critical. I'm just observing facts here that I see on telly. And I don't want to be that sort of athlete. And, you know, I want people to understand that you choose, you know, you choose everything about what you do as an athlete. You choose how much preparation you do, how much. How much you're prepared to push yourself in a race situation, how far you're willing to go, when to turn off, when to give up. You know, these are all things that cross everybody's mind in every situation, every training session, every race you ever. This is getting hard. Am I going to give up now? You know, and don't underestimate. The pros are in the same. They're facing the same questions that have been thrown at them by other competitors.

On an extreme scale. Yeah.

Which is the beauty of sport, isn't it? And the feeling that you have when you finish and are successful, and whether it's a PB or whether you've won the race, they're both successes. Is incredible feeling. And one that you do all that work for to get that PB and it's just so satisfying. And yet, you know, you see the other side where people are distraught, in tears. It's just the highs and lows of sport are amazing. And I'm continually admiring people who handle these situations. And you can rattle those people off, the ones who are champions through adversity and the ones who are, you know, front runners or, you know, I don't even know what the word is. You know, the guys in football always run forward but never run back and defend. You know, guys who've got, you know, their tailwind with them, you know, as soon as it gets hard, they've gone missing. So, yeah, that's a really good point.

You make with Hershey. And the fact that if he does this right, you know, this disappointment, this bitter Disappointment will be absolute elation when he finally does win and. And it could start a winning record for him.

Yeah, and that's what we started with was through adversity comes either you give up and you're never seen again. He had two good races in the Tour, he nearly won and we never see him again, or he turns into a Cancellara or a Sagan where he's just a perpetual winner. And I think the latter from what I can see.

Yeah, that's good. So let's keep talking about Sagan a little bit because you're right, that stage was one of the most exciting flat stages. Any stage with crosswinders tends to be exciting for those reasons. But they made it exciting because they put the pedal to the metal from the get go, which is so awesome. And a lot of the riders finished and said it was just quote unquote, full gas, which is what they say. And it's just, it's just ruined them the whole day. And I thought that was just awesome. And he just said, stuff you. I'm going to take this green jersey back. You know, I want this. And that's that winning attitude. Even though the flip side is that he's actually in really bad form at the moment and he's not sprinting nearly as well as he could. He stuffed the sprint up at the end, which was also very disappointing. In his own words, you know, the whole day in the post race interview he said that's fucking cycling. And I think that was like a couple of things. It was one, that it was such a crazy day, two, that they took the bull by the horns and made it their day and got him back the green jersey. But then also he stuffed, stuffed the sprint up and he dropped his chain. So I think he stuffed the sprint up before he dropped his chain, but also dropping his chain and he had to roll to the line. But yeah, he's also in pretty bad form and there is rumor that it could be his own fault because contrary to a lot of other riders, I don't think he took the COVID training program as seriously because he doesn't like training indoors. And so he's kind of come to this position in not as good form as normal and he's having to write himself into form.

Yeah. And as you said earlier, we're really just looking from the outside and we don't really know exactly what his program was, but I do know he did a lot of mountain biking, which is really good cross training to do. But as we've found out in our Covid experience, the laboratory style training that we've been able to execute has had incredible results. And, you know, indoors, which, you know, I agree with him, but sometimes you have to make sacrifices in order to get to the end result. And time will tell, because there's plenty of riders in the history of the Tour de France or in the Giro or the Vuelta who have ridden themselves into the race. And Egan Bernal is one of those guys who went under the radar and only really dominated the race from, you know, stage 18 onwards. And, you know, even the year Cadell won, he was thereabouts. But, you know, the last couple of stages, Alpe d' Huez and the time trial and Galibiere, those three stages which, you know, we were fortunate enough to be at, were the days where he just took that. He took that Tour, he made it his own. You know, he rode solo up Gulibier with 20 people sitting on his wheel. No one helped him. And he was against Schleck and Contador up the road, and they're just examples of people who, you know, who can ride themselves into the Tour. And I think what Sagan is hopefully thinking about is by the time he gets to week two and three, he will start to get the form back, because you don't lose, you know, you don't lose fitness. It just. It's just simmering underneath. And I've got a feeling he's a champion. I think, yeah, he might be underdone. And I reckon it cost him those points in that sprint because had he been on form like he would normally be, he would have been on Van Aert's wheel and following him or probably bumping him out of the way to get in front of him. But I think when you're not as fit, you know, the race was so hard from start to finish. When you're not quite on your high level of fitness, it can affect your sprint. So as we all know, sprinting tired after one of the most excruciatingly grueling stages of the Tour, where you're on the, you know, on the full gas the whole time, it is hard to sprint when you're not fit. Yet. Van Aert sprinted almost like it was the easiest sprint that he'd ever done in his life. And I think it's because he's got that unbelievable form at the moment. His fitness and their whole team is, yeah, they look different to everybody else.

He's almost a different topic. Van Aert, he's in the form of his life. He is an unbelievable beast. And he just, he's as strong as they come. You know, I feel like even Sagan at his best might not be able to beat him.

Yeah, but when I look at that stage and I think, you know, the director, sportif and Sagan and their whole team got together and what an unbelievable decision they made. We are going to get the green jersey back tomorrow. And they did it from, from kilometer one. And so their first goal, get the green jersey. Did they achieve that? Yes, they did. Second goal, make the race as hard as possible and get rid of some of, you know, the sprinters along the way. Did they achieve that? They got rid of Bennett, they got rid of Caleb.

Caleb. Yep.

And there were two key sprinters and unfortunately, you know, the third thing was win stage, but he didn't get that. But, you know, two out of three was a pretty good result for what he was trying to achieve on that day. So you can, you can still have a semi good, successful day. But, you know, Sagan's not happy with that. You know, as he said, you know, racing, you know, good and bad and that's the beauty of it. And you know, time will tell whether his preparation is going to be good or bad throughout this Tour.

And that's an interesting point. We also wanted to touch on is the fact that it is a three week tour, so Sagan could well write himself into form in weeks two or three. And he's that type of rider that he just needs that, that racing under his belt. But you talk about this a lot, and this topic has been touched on a lot on this podcast is execution and understanding the requirements of a race. And this is a three week race. You know, it's not a one week race, it's not a, it's not a seven day race or a five day race or even a ten day race. And so we're only one week in. And a lot can change in the next two weeks. A lot can unfold and you can be good in week one, but you've got to be good in week three as well if you want to win. And Cadel showed that he was good in those last few stages and he, and he won it. But we've had plenty of examples, not just in the Tour de France, but other Grand Tours where it's been the opposite result and we've really got to pay attention to that and see which riders can hold up.

Yeah. And look, let's just use Cadel again. I think 2008 at the, the Giro, I could be wrong with the dates, it doesn't matter. I think he was in the lead for a lot of days in the Maya Rosa, and he was a very young rider. I think he won 2011 tour. That was the year we were there. So this is Tour de France.

Yeah.

Yep. This was 2005 Giro, I think. And again, I'm not exactly 100% sure about that, but the point that we're going to make is, as a young, inexperienced rider, he faltered so badly halfway through that stage. He was writing the house down. And then the second half of the Tour, I think he ended up. I think he stayed in the top 10, but he lost truckloads of time. And what a learning experience. And, you know, that 2005 tour, and he had, you know, second places in 2008, 9, 10. All those experiences like we're talking about with Hershey eventuated for Cadell winning the Tour de France. You know, it wasn't just the combination of his good training and good form in 2011. It was all those bad experiences that he had to go through. And that was six years of. I think he broke his collarbone three times in that period. He was in winning positions and lost it. Things went wrong, you know, so many things went wrong. But the sweet feeling of winning, after all, that adversary is even better. But the point, what we're talking about here is three weeks is a long time. And I know before last night's stage, I was talking in a conversation about who is the contenders. Before tonight, before last night's stage, which was the second stage of the Pyrenees, who are the contenders in this race? And I was going through them. I was thinking, well, the first stage in the Pyrenees pocket chart just showed, whoa. He's. He is very, very talented. And we know that from previous year. We haven't seen Bernal, but we know he's. He's there abouts. So he's defending champions and defending champion. And he came good at the right time last year, but he had a better team around him last year who enabled him to go under the radar, where, you know, he had Thomas and Froome, so no one was really looking at him. Then you've got Roglic, obviously, you know, super talented, and Quintana, you know, really looking like he's got fantastic form. And that was probably the four riders that. That I thought were only the only chances to win the Tour from here. You know, making a decision two nights ago, that's what I thought. The only four people could win this Tour. There's people knocking on the door like probably got this wrong. Lander was probably, you know, just, just as good had he not lost some time in the wind. I think he had a mechanical. Did he?

No, no, he just, he just got caught in a crosswind, I think.

Well, that's racing and therefore he's not as good a racer as I. And that's a point we'll talk about probably riding in the wind, but, but certainly those riders. And you know, you've got Richie Port, you've got Lander, you've got Molama, Iran, definitely, and Martin, Martin Dumoulin, you know, Yates. There's still some riders there who, Hershey, who are just on the next level almost. And it was interesting that race panned out with those guys that we mentioned, being that the first, you know, it was, it was Hershey, then those next four guys, then a next group. So it was almost the ones that I predicted. But I'm gonna be interesting to see if that prediction holds through till the end of the Tour. And how would you, how would you, you know, looking at the age of the guys. And that's a real factor. Like we've talked about experience and having some really hard, tough chores that you have to go through an apprenticeship before you actually get to, to ride properly for three weeks. So measuring your effort, executing your effort over three weeks. Sure. Poga chair looks fantastic now, but can he do this for three weeks? So I've got a question mark over that. Roglic has already had a couple of years where he's gone fantastic until the last four days and really struggled. So I think he's done his apprenticeship, so my money's probably on him to come good this year. Bernal's already won it once, but he's got more this year. He doesn't seem to be in the same form, but maybe he'll ride into form.

And they say that the Alps will suit the Colombians as well.

Yes. You know, I didn't mention Esteban Chavez either as a person who's on the fringe, who has the ability, but it's just not quite there. But yeah, so, so Quintana is the only other guy that I think has the capabilities and has won tours before. That can come good as the weeks and days go by. So the execution point is who can do this over a three week period. So when you get to the day 18, 19 and 20, no one really does remember how outstanding Pogkajar was in day six, seven and eight. No one remembers how good Hershey was on day five and nine. If they're not there at day 18, 19, 20, you totally forget about them. And it's like, it reminds me of the start of an 800. Who remembers who was leading for the first 400 of an 800?

No one.

Who remembers who won the race? Everybody remembers who won the race. Who remembers who broke away in some bike race for, you know, for half a stage and then came five minutes down at the end of the ride? No one remembers that person. Anybody who takes off at the start and doesn't execute well, everybody forgets about them. But they look good at the start and that's about it. So yeah, the execution point, whether it's three weeks or one, one one day race or 100 meter sprint, you know, sure I got out of the box and I had a 1 meter lead in 100 meter sprint, but I came last. So, you know, I have to learn how to run the 100 meters, not just the start. So there's so many examples where we're going to find out very soon who are the contenders and who are the pretenders.

Yeah, and it's been an incredibly tough start. A lot of the riders are saying, you know, there hasn't been any really easy stages. There was that one stage last week which was just afloat pretty much. But then the rest of the stages have been incredibly tough and riders are expecting an easier stage on a flat stage. And it hasn't been. And so that is going to make a difference in weeks. Two or three riders might actually pay for it.

I was just going to say before we finish, who's looking after themselves the best? Who's making sure they're eating or eating their food and their carbs at night and getting the massage and getting plenty of sleep and rehydrating and doing all the 1 percenters that sky are so good at now that Jumbo Visma have sort of taken over as the more professional team. All these little things now start to count to how you perform. And are you, Are there riders in this peloton saving themselves, you know, as long as they're not losing time. Don't underestimate those guys who are still in the top 10 who are only 13 seconds down, who are refusing to go on attacks and refusing to, to cover. You know, it's not a single one day race we're talking about. Even though each day is a one day race, it may be four or five little, little guys in the, in the peloton who are Quintana. That might be his tactic and it would be, you know, a prophecy if we're talking about it right now at the end of week one, where today's the rest day. Is Quintana that guy who's gonna come good stage 18, 19 and 20, when it counts, as long as he hasn't lost any time?

Yeah, yeah, there's, there is a lot of that for this tour. It's about who is minimizing any damage anywhere and who's maximizing the little gains and profit. And Roglich is definitely already. He's got a couple of 10 second bonuses which. And he's just put himself in the right spot and he's just won by eight seconds or so against the other groups and that's why he's in the yellow Jersey by just 15 seconds. So all these little things he's done have actually added to him being the lead at the moment. And what you talked about with the professionalism and who's recovering the best. You know, that's where Team sky pretty much every year has shown they are the most professional team and they have all those bases covered. But this year they're not as much of a reckoning force. You know, they might just not have as strong riders, but pretty much we're not, we're not seeing the traditional eight sky riders on the front the same boring tactic. I mean, it's a winning tactic for them, but it's. The last six years has basically been the same. It's just this sky train. They ride a tempo that no one can attack. They're strong climbers, just come over the top and win. And it's been so good to see this year that Jumbo Visma are taking it to them. And also pretty much every main climb, even Jumbo Visma haven't had all their riders. They've had their riders at the start, but one or two kilometers into the climb, it's been pretty much every GC contender riding for themselves. And this is where I disagreed with you a little bit about the top riders. You know, you were saying that pretty much those four seem to be the main contenders. And I'm saying, well, I'm looking at the top 10. And I love the GC race this year because it's the most exciting it's been in 10 years. There's 10 riders in there that are all within 50 seconds that are showing such promise and are riding so well. And even last night it showed that even though Roglic and Poga and Bernal and Landa got away, when we see that in other years where Quintana gets dropped or riders get dropped once they crack, they tend to lose 1, 2, 3 minutes and then it's race over. Whereas last night, that next group, they got dropped, but then they held that 10 second gap and they didn't lose more than that. So you may be riding that. Roglic or Bernal are pretty much the only ones that can win it. But it's really exciting to see the next top six or top eight or top 10 who are just 15, 20 or 30 seconds behind. See what they do over the three weeks and they might blow up or they might be able to just hang in there. And if they're riding smart and they're not losing time on the crosswind stages, which Lanner and Pogaar already made that mistake, GC riders that don't make those mistakes for the rest of the Tour could actually hang in there and get a podium finish or potentially take it to Rogue Chobonal if they're feeling really good. So for me, it's the most exciting GC racing years and it's so awesome. I just love seeing that it's eight riders or 10 riders one on one with each other up the hill. Compared to them being dragged by their teammates, it's such, such good racing.

Yep. And look, don't underestimate. It's just not about who's the best climber. You know, the Tour could be won or lost in those crosswind days, you know, And Richie ports a classic. He's done it year after year, lost time every crosswind day. And you know, you look at the way Yates rode and Matt White really was disappointed with the Mitchelton Scott group because Yates was isolated by himself in that front group. Yates was fine, he had no trouble. But Matt White being the professional saying where's your teammates? When you know, yet Yates had no teammates and was up in the front group. And you know, Trek, Segafredo. What were they doing to help port? Well, what was Porte doing to help himself? Just poor positioning. And that's what the GC is about. Not just the best hill climber, best tactician, best bike rider. And that's what's fantastic about a three week tour. It's just not about who can climb the hill the best. That's got to contribute for sure. But if you're not actually doing the stages where they don't seem significant like that one day with Bora Hansgrove's tactic that caught out so many riders. So they're examples of what can happen.

Yeah. And looking at Porte is its own topic in itself. I don't think we'll spend much time on that because he's frustrated a lot of Australian fans. I think throughout the years he's shown so much promise and he's such a good rider. And last night he showed how good he can be. You know, when those top four went, he didn't go with the acceleration, but then he gapped everyone else and caught them with his own tempo. That's incredible riding. But then on the flip side of the coin, they hit the descent and he got dropped by the same group. So. And then he rode so well in most of the crosswind day and was in the front group. And then with 20k to go, he got dropped again. And so.

And Zachary is another example of, you know, cycling is uphill, downhill, crosswind, flat. You have to be. You have to be able to do all those things to be a champion cyclist. Zachary and should have won stage seven or six. He was the fastest hill climber. He broke away, and yet on the descent he kept losing time and lost the stage. Should have won the stage purely because his descending skills were horrible compared to the rest of the level of the professional's descending skills. And, you know, I remember him crashing and ending up in the creek bed on the descent from. I'm not sure which hill it was, but it might have been Von 2. And he was in a bad way. He left the road, went into the paddock and landed in a creek. And, you know, that would knock your confidence. But as you know, as Robbie McEwen was saying, well, you go and practice and get better at it so that it doesn't end up costing you a stage in the Tour de France, which, as a cyclist, that's the thing you're there for, is to win a stage, you know, or win the Tour. That'd be so. I'd be so disappointed with myself if.

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And the last point you mentioned in there with, you know, you've got to be a good hill climber to sender right in the wind is the time trial. And then in week three, we've got that one time trial to finish the race. And that could actually be the decider because these riders could all battle it out and be within a minute. And it's such an interesting time trial because it's complete steep uphill finish. So, you know, you might be a really good flat time trialer, but you might not be used to a time trial like this, which has such a steep finish. So it's going to be so fascinating to see how the race unfolds. For another two weeks and then to see how that time trial plays a part with these. The top 8 or top 10 in GC contention, all being so close at the moment. I can't wait for it.

I'm so excited that the time trial could be the decider. Jordan. It's that close this year. And, you know, a time trial on the flat compared to a time trial on the climb is going to suit different people. Roglich can handle both. Quintana is not that good a time trialer on the flat yet he'll be fine on a hill. When cadell won in 2011, the time trial around the Grenoble circuit had a climb in it and a descent and a flat bit. So it suited Cadell and, you know, the Schleck brothers you think would have suited them, but the climb wasn't long enough, but it was still enough for Cadell to put time into them. And basically, if you ignore one aspect of your, of your cycling skill set and time trialing is one of those, it could cost you the Tour, which it cost the select boys so many times that they lost Tours because they couldn't. Time trial.

Yeah.

And this is going to be really exciting. I love the fact that the time trial is going to make such an important part of the outcome of the Tour and we just disregard the time trial as, as something that's not part of cycling. Well, you know, the actual event time trialing is riding at threshold or above, but you should be doing that as part of your training anyway. So it should be natural that, that you do take your threshold training onto a race situation, which is a time trial, and practice it. And because it will, it will be part of, you know, if you ever break away in a road race, that you can time trial solo, that you're not used to just sitting in a bunch and being able to win a sprint. So it is part of cycling that you should develop in your armoury. And let's face it, the best GC riders are the best time trialers and that has happened year in, year out for the last hundred years.

So to finish off, this is a big podcast about cycling and the Tour de France, and it's one of the greatest races in the world. But what can you learn as a triathlete, watching the Tour de France and everything we've spoken about?

Yeah, great question. And the similarities don't seem anything resembling each other, but they are totally the same. So, you know, let's just take a three week Grand Tour. It's three weeks and if you divide a triathlon into three stages, you've got swim, bike and run a grand two, you've got week one, week two, week three. So you've really got to execute like I would be do. Breaking it down as a, as a Grand Tour rider, you know, first week. What have I got to achieve in these, these races? Couple of hill climbs, couple of crosswinds, some up and down lumpy stages, one sprinter stage. I've been looking at all those stages and trying to create a plan that I can succeed and not lose and limit my losses for week two and week three. In the triathlon, the swim, don't start out too hard. In the swim. It's a 3.8k swim or a 1.9k swim, depending on what race you're doing. Measure your effort over the swim because you've still got to ride and run in the second and third legs. Just like you've got second week and third week of the gc. On the bike, you're feeling good, you jump on the bike, don't ride 20% higher the power numbers that you're supposed to be because it's a time trial, you know your number. Don't wreck your race by riding too hard. Same in the Grand Tour. Don't ride flat out in week two and have nothing left for week three. You know, stage three of the, of the triathlon is the run. And if you've executed stage, you know, swim and bike well enough to run as best as you can close to your pb fresh running, you'll be hard to beat, you know, and that is the key to a triathlon. Measuring your effort over three events and you know, getting into the last week of the Grand Tour. If you've got nothing left and you're in GC contention, how disappointed would you be that you've, you've spent all your bickies and you've got nothing left. It's happened many, many times to many Tour riders as we talked about. So the similarities are there and it comes back to executing whether it's a one day bike race or a triathlon with three, three different sports to execute, or whether it's a three week tour, you have to execute with your ability, knowing that you can either blow it by going too hard too early and have nothing left to finish off with, or you can measure your effort and plan it, train for it and then execute it. And that's possibly the lessons that we really want to get across today is that, you know, having such extreme sports such as a triathlon Ironman, such as a three week grand tour, they're very similar in endurance sports and they, and they have to have patience. And if you don't execute with patience, you will be, you'll come off second best, you know, panicking too soon, changing your tack. Vastly different. And we talk about the start with Matt White changing his, his plan, being flexible. But you can't do someone else's race. That's important. And you actually have to be patient to follow your strategies that you've trained for and prepared for. So they're the things that I think are really what we, what we're trying to get out of this podcast today, to get people to understand how important that is. And without that thought process, you know, you really just rely on other people around you. You're just riding or racing other people's races and you've lost control of what, what you're setting out to do. Sure, you can be flexible, but you need to be in control of the whole time of what you're trying to achieve. Yeah, perfect.

Well, that's a good way to finish this week. We're pretty excited for the races still to come. The stage is still to come. Uh, we'll probably keep talking about this topic plus anything else that comes up over the next few podcasts because as with is always the case with the Tour de France. So much happens and there's going to be a lot of lessons learned, a lot of things we can pay attention to that really will help us train and race better. So that's it for this episode. Just a reminder, if you want to get our best tips of how to train smarter and race faster, the best way to do that is to go subscribe to our email list. You can do that by going to get that's getfastpodcast.com you just go to that website and you can chuck in your email and you'll get access to our programs when we release them. And you can also, when you do that, you will get a bonus cheat sheet, which is an expert secrets cheat sheet guide with the best tips and advice from all the expert guests on our podcast and stuff that they've said to help you train smarter and race faster. So that's it for this episode. We'll see you next time.