From Local Rider to Jumbo-Visma: The Fascinating Journey of Chris Harper

Doing your training correctly, but sticking to the program, not, not under doing it, not overdoing it. They're all really good with their nutrition if they know they need to drop a bit of weight before a Grand Tour there, you know, working with the nutrition is super hard to drop weight, but I think the main thing is, you know, it's just consistency more than anything, you know.

This podcast is brought to you by Trivalo Coaching, where we help triathlete and cyclists like you train smarter to race faster. I'm your host, Jordan Donnelly, and on my left is former Australian Ironman champion and head coach of Trivelo Coaching, Jarrett Donnelly. Our guest today is an Australian cyclist who has just recently made the move from Jumbo Visma, one of the biggest pro cycling teams in the world, to Australia's pro team bike exchange. He was a bit of a late bloomer to cycling, however, he very quickly moved up the ranks of Australian cycling and received his professional contract only a few years ago. This is the insight into the story of Chris Harper, who takes us behind the scenes of what it was like to first turn pro, what it means to be a cyclist on one of the best teams in the world, and tells us what's fact and what's fiction about life as a pro cyclist. This was a really enjoyable interview and we thank Chris for being so open about his training, his specific sessions, a lot of the details about his life and his upcoming aspirations on his new team. It's always great, isn't it, dad, to get granted access to someone like Chris. And as always, we thrived in this interview.

Yeah, and it's good to have an elite pro cyclist on our podcast and we're really grateful that he gave us such a lot of his time today. And yeah, look, his journey into becoming a professional elite cyclist was quite, quite a long time coming because he really didn't get his first pro contract till he was 25 years of age. So that's quite late when you see guys like Egan, Bernal and the likes winning tours at 22, 23 years of age. So he really came to his fulfillment as an athlete later on in the journey. And boy, what a journey it's been with arguably the best team in the world. And now his journey takes another step towards something new with bike exchange. And he was, as you said, very open with all of his information. And I love the fact that he really said there's no extremeness in his training, there's no extremeness in his eating, doing everything as balanced as he can and not doing Exceptional things, but being consistent. And that's the theme that I'm really pleased to hear because if that's the level it takes to be a pro, then as age groupers, we should be following that same footpath and that same method of actually just trying to get the best out of ourselves by being consistent rather than being exceptional all the time.

When this episode comes out, it will be the nationals race have just happened, Australian National Championships and then the Tour down under will be the week after. So if you are listening, you can check the results and see how Chris went at the nationals and compare that to some of the information that was shared in this episode. So look, look forward to the interview. It's a real good one. We went for over an hour because there was just so much detail we wanted to ask and he answered everything. So enjoy it. Another episode with a pro athlete and it's always amazing to get their insights. So without further ado, here is the interview with Chris Harper. Chris, a very big welcome to the podcast and the episode. Thank you very much for joining us.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

The first question we want to know, we want to ask every athlete, this is, what training session did you do today?

I actually had a rest day. So nothing. Has that been a full rest day?

You do absolutely nothing?

Yeah, pretty well. Yeah, at the moment a rest days completely off the bike, whereas, yeah, recovery days normally go for a nice easy spin or something, whereas today it's sort of just trying to chill out as much as possible and get ready for the next little block of training.

Do you have many total rest days, Chris? I'm really intrigued that you haven't a rest day.

It's great. Quite a bit actually, especially just in the last couple months change trainers. So, yeah, since I have started working with my, my new trainer, I, I actually haven't really had many recovery days, more just complete rest, which I, I actually used to not enjoy. I used to prefer, prefer getting out on the bike still. But yeah, I don't know, recently I've also been enjoying the idea of taking the day off completely just because, yeah, you do have a full day to, I mean, catch up on, you know, normal life stuff that you don't do when you're tired from training but also, you know, you don't have over your head like some days, recovery day, you're thinking, I've still got to go do an hour on the bike or the weather's not good and I don't really want to do it. I don't really want to Jump on the trainer. So I think the, the rest day can be quite mentally and also definitely, I notice physically it's quite refreshing to just, yeah, take the day off completely and then reset and get ready for the next. Next bit of training.

I'm also fascinated by the rest day. Is it just one a week or are you having multiple full rest days per week?

At the moment I'm having pretty much two days a week off. So yeah, yeah, it sounds like a lot but I mean, yeah, by the time you. Yeah, at the moment I'm sort of doing a like a two day block and a three day block and yeah, normally, normally by the time I get to the end of those those I'm feeling quite ready for a. Yeah, like yesterday for example is a pretty, pretty decent day of training. So today I definitely feel like chilling out a bit.

So you're in Adelaide at the moment and I imagine yesterday would have involved a few climbs around the local Adelaide hills.

Not too bad actually. I, I had a, had a five hour endurance ride and I actually did a, did a. I don't do it much but I, I decided to head out to the Barossa which is for me I'm up in the Adelaide Hill. So it's mostly a flat loop with, you know, just some rolling, rolling climbs. Ended up being a bit closer to six hours just because as I said I don't, don't head out that way much. So I didn't calculate it quite correctly. But yeah, the training is. Yeah, I think Adelaide is. We're pretty lucky with the training and the amount of options we have.

We will get more into your training structure and the specifics of your training sessions because we're so intrigued in that about that. But we want to really start by going into a bit, a bit about your story and how you've gotten here in your cycling journey. So can you tell us about how you even got into cycling and that journey right up into you started to get noticed by Australian NRS teams?

Yeah, I started quite a little bit unorthodox I guess compared to a lot of the guys. Especially in South Australia. Most guys sort of go to the track and then, and then get into the road from there. But I was just pretty standard when I was younger, playing tennis and then once I got to high school started playing cricket and footy just to, you know, be able to play sport with mates really. And I think it was always, I always just liked endurance sports. I used to love doing a bit of running and normally when our big sort of school Holidays was in the middle of the year was always when the Tour de France was on. And so if I was mucking around with my brother, you know, we're staying up a bit late, so put on the TV and we normally, I don't know why, we just randomly would always sort of end up watching the finish of the stages of the Tour de France. Yeah, they were always pretty late. So, yeah, we were mucking around as you do as a young kid. But, yeah, we. Yeah, I just sort of thought I might. I might like to try cycling. And then I think it was pretty close to my birthday or Christmas maybe, and I was in. In Victoria visiting some family and my. My grandma just offered to buy me a road bike because I was. I was interested in cycling. And then, yeah, got my first road bike. And from there I, I didn't really. It took me a little while. I just rode around for a bit and then eventually I looked up a local club where there was a criterium on. When I did a criterium, I still, still remember it clear because I think I lasted. Lasted maybe five laps on the back of E grade and then, then got dropped. And then, you know, from there, of course you're just like, all right, I need to come back and I need a. I need to be able to finish. And I think from there it was just a natural progression of, you know, I just wanted to keep moving up the grades. I think once I got. Got out of E grade from D grade to C grade was quite quick. And you hear what other people's training was, which is, you know, always funny way that people tell you how to train. But yeah, I progressed quite quickly there. And then once I got a bit more serious, I was pretty fortunate to meet, yeah, one of the guys who's. Who's one of my closest friends. Now, you've probably heard of him, his name's Cam Bailey. I met him through my local bike shop. He was working there. So I started training with Cam and he sort of pushed me to get into a bit of NRS racing. And at the time, yeah, of course I didn't have a team or anything, so I was just registering and getting put in one of those composite teams. And then, yeah, Mum and Dad came over and I think I did the Tour of the Great south coast and True Gippsland in my. In my first year and again got absolutely smashed. Couldn't finish criteriums, was too on the limit to eat. When I was doing the road races, I was just fully in survival mode. So Yeah, I probably should have, probably should have taken up a different sport, but I was pretty stubborn and wanted to, wanted to keep progressing and luckily knowing, knowing Cam, you know, I had a pretty, pretty good role model and through him got introduced to another one of my closest mates, Alex Edmondson, who at the time was going to London for the Olympics on the track and all that. So I think I just got a group of friends and you know, had a good, good couple role models around me and started progressing from there and luckily enough made it into a few NRS teams and I think it sort of really started to change or I started to feel progression when I went to a team called State of Matter, which at the time was managed by, Sorry, there's all my dogs, someone. Yeah, State of Matter with Damo. And you know, at the time I still wasn't going that great in the nrs, but he sort of noticed a couple little stages where he thought I was doing okay, took me on the team and then from there I was able to do races like Herald Sun Tour, which, yeah, you finally get to race, you know, Team sky, which was the biggest, biggest team in the world. So it was pretty exciting for me. And then, then from that I sort of got in contact with Andrew Christie Johnson, who had been running sort of, you know, the team that everyone wanted to be in, in, in professional cycling. So from there it was, yeah, that next, next step up and once I got into that team, more international racing and, and from there it became a bit more, I wouldn't say realistic but, you know, definitely the expectation of trying to get a professional contract increased and yeah, I worked pretty hard for a couple years to try to get that.

Did you feel when you were having little success that this was a waste of time and you were, you were in the wrong sport at any point on that journey or did you think, no, I just need to learn how to do this better? Did you have confidence in yourself at that point or were you losing confidence?

No, definitely not. I wouldn't say I'm, you know, the most self confident person. I think I definitely rely on having a few people around me that I trust and yeah, probably lean on for advice quite a bit. And yeah, Andrew Christie Johnson was definitely, definitely one of those guys, I mean, as well as my closest friends always, you know, you'd start to get a bit in your head or be a bit down and think negatively and they'd say, nah, rubbish, you know, don't think like that. We know you're capable of doing it. Just, just be Patient. But yeah, Andrew was quite huge for me. I sort of had done, I think two, two trips to Europe and yeah, I was pushing pretty hard and before the sort of biggest race I had of the year, I pushed a bit too hard, went away and did altitude and yeah, basically over trained, massively under fueled, massively trying to drop weight and I ended up anemic. And yeah, basically I couldn't even get through this, through this tour. I was just made myself pretty crook. And after that, to be honest, I, I was just my, I was like, ah, you know, this is enough for me. I'm not gonna become a professional. I think at the time I was 25 or something and I thought, yeah, maybe it's time to grow up a little bit and go get a job. Get a job, find something that's going to give me some money. And also, yeah, I'm a bit sick of going out and suffering and killing myself in training to sort of have no rewards. So I remember calling up Andrew and saying, yeah, I think I'm going to quit. And he just completely changed my mindset. He was like, nah, you're not quitting. You've got the goods and I'm going to help you get there. And then from there I came back to Australia, Andrew started coaching me and then, you know, from about September of October that year, we were sort of just plugging away at the big goal, being in good shape. Once I got to Europe the following year to try and try and get a pro contract.

That's truly an awesome story.

Yeah.

I was going to ask what was the turning point because, you know, to have the mindset to suffer through and you've shown it from that first, those first few crit races when you're in a grade, it's the same suffering that you went through. Once you got to each level, once you get to NRS and I, I imagine then once you got on a pro team and we'll get into Jumbo soon, you know, a similar thing happened. But yeah, you're kind of used to it by then. What, what happened over that next one to two years that led you from that turning point where you almost quit to you get a call and you're signed by the biggest pro team in the world, Jumbo Visma.

Yeah, well, yeah, again, it was just sort of. I think it was mainly just getting my head around, you know, I did take a bit of a break when I did want to quit and I stopped, stopped riding pretty good for maybe a month or two and I just started doing Normal things that I'd sort of skipped out on when I was a bit younger, like, you just being around people a bit more, hanging out with friends and going out, having a bit of fun. And then I sort of just hit a point one day where I was like, ah, this has been fun, but, you know, I actually miss. I miss training sort of just clicked. And then from there I was like, all right, I need to get back into this a lot more. A lot more serious. I think it was about September and I was like, well, Nationals, you know, it's not far away. So I'd already started working with Andrew and we were like, yeah, let's. Let's make the goal go Nationals. And with the idea of making. Making uni sa, racing the Tour down under and then. Then, you know, we'll have a really good block over summer of. Of races. I think at the time I had Nationals Tour down under and then I think, yeah, we had Herald Sun Tour as well. So, yeah, Andrew always said, like, you know, if you have a really good start to the year, you can already have. Have a professional contract just in that first, first three months. So, yeah, we started working towards that. And I think that year I had a good nationals. I always get them mixed up, but I think that year I was third at nationals.

Was that 2018, Chris?

I think this was 2019.

2019.

2018.

I think you were third 2018. I'll help you out and done a little bit of research. And you were second 2019. And that year in 2019, you got fourth at the Herald Sun Tour and got second at the Nationals and you won Mont Blanc and you won Tour of Japan. And so things quickly progressed, didn't they?

From.

From.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. So, like, this summer. Summer was quite good. And obviously I think I did. Did down under that year, or maybe that was the year we missed down under because of the. The passport, the biological passport. But I. I still had a good. A relatively good Sun Tour being. Being fourth. And then from there I had another little rest and with the idea, all right, now we're gonna go and build towards Europe. We sort of knew that one race in particular, Tour de Savoie, Mont Blanc is. Yeah, it's really highly regarded amongst the World Tour team. So pretty much the. Yeah, you could look back at the past few years, I think, and the guys who are sort of on the podium there end up with professional contracts and some guys from the team previously, like Ben o' Connor had obviously had. I think he was third. Third overall. And that's when he got his professional contract. So the real idea was to focus on Mont Blanc and then have a nice progression of races to sort of get into the rhythm of racing again. So when I went to tour of Japan, I actually didn't have much ambition for the overall. I was more thinking, yeah, this is a good tune up race before I, before I go to Europe and try get stuck in over there. And I just, I'd been training really well. I'd also got a bit of help with my nutrition which made a massive difference for me. And, and yeah, I just felt good in Japan. And I think I messaged Andrew the night before Mount Fuji which sort of decided the overall and I was like, oh, what do you reckon I need to do if I want to win this thing? And I think he came back and he was like, oh, I think you roughly need to do around. I think it was like 380 watts for half an hour. And I was like, oh, okay, that's pretty solid. And then yeah, I think I, I won it solo and I think I did 1 watt less than what he, than what he predicted. So yeah, I, that was. And I think that gave me a good bit of confidence. Like I'm on the right path now and you know, just need to keep consistently doing what I'm doing, not, not do anything stupid in training or try to do anything crazy. And, and I think I'll go, all right.

And so what was the difference from when Andrew took over to your training from what you were doing previously? What, what, what do you think in your mind changed significantly from. Yeah, obviously you, you, you've got talent. It was just a matter of exposing it really. And, and you weren't doing that previously. And all of a sudden as a 25 year old you've had all this, this, this time from 18, 19 all the way to 25 where things aren't really progressing the way they did once Andrew took over. So what did you do differently?

Yeah, I think the main thing is just, you know, I wasn't doing any in the past. Maybe I'd been a bit, you know, I had trainers and coaches and they were all very good. But also they may, because you're not working with them, you know, quite as closely as say now I work with my trainer, you know, it's not quite as close contact or they'd been coaches with a lot of other athletes under them, they were a bit busier and you know, I could easily sometimes turn a five hour ride into seven hours and push a little bit Harder and that sort of thing. Whereas with Andrew, I was. I just started to feel a lot more accountable. But also, you know, we were having a conversation every day about how training was going. If I was having a bad day, I'd message Andrew and say, I'm not really feeling too good today. And we'd adjust the plan or vice versa. He sort of knew me very well and he'd pick these days and he'd say, I bet you Chris is going to go test himself on this day. So he'd sort of have in his mind that that was going to happen. So I think that was the biggest. And everyone's different, of course. You know, I know guys who like a program, they like to sort of be left alone to do their program and yeah, that's just how they work best. Whereas the best way for me to work is having someone, you know, easy to contact and getting a lot of feedback on what I'm doing and giving them a lot of feedback on how it's feeling. And with Andrew, I had that. So I, I just felt. Felt like we had a really, really good relationship. And yeah, just. It just worked really well for me having someone I could, could sort of relay a lot of thoughts off of and give a lot of feedback to how my training was going and where I thought I needed to improve.

There's a bit of a buzzword around training at the moment. It's intensity control and it's what a lot of the pro athletes are kind of leaning towards. And it's just making sure that going over exactly what you're saying on the easy days or hard days than they should be, is that kind of what you would summarize as the key change? And what you're describing, especially now when you're so committed to having two full rest days off a week. Is that how you're describing it? It's really just making sure that intensity control is in line with how you're feeling.

Yeah, I think so. I mean, I noticed it when I first turned professional as well. You get this idea in your head or a lot of the stuff out there on what professionals do. To be honest, it's just, you know, over exaggerated. I think a lot of the times. Yeah, okay, we train bloody hard. I'm not going to take that away from us. But the luxury of being a professional is you've also got a lot of time to recover. So I think some people take that out of context sometimes and think, yeah, I've got to go out. And every training session I've Got to come home and be absolutely smashed. Otherwise I didn't do a good training session. And, and yeah, I just think that's nonsense. I come home from a lot of training and I'm not, not on my hands and knees. You know, I know I've done a good day of training but you don't have to, you don't have to suffer every day if, if that is the right way to put it. So yeah, for sure. I mean there's, there's a lot of, a lot of stuff out there at the moment, especially about you know, the whole zone. True Zone 2 training and how important that is and all that. And I'd say yeah, that's probably, probably what you see a lot more in. Yeah. From my side anyway, I'd say that is pretty accurate. A lot of the training is more based around those lower intensities and you're just touching on those higher intensities when it's needed.

I'm just gonna ask an obvious question from that is once you have gone from having Andrew on a day to day help basis and then you've gone to a team like Jumbo, how does that structure change with the, the coaching that you're receiving through the team as compared to an individual coach? Can you keep your same coach or are you then in the hands of the team?

I'm not sure what it is. I'd say most days everything's been done internally. So with Jumbo it was, they've got I think four or five trainers who all communicate with each other and have pretty similar training philosophies and you're given your trainer once you join the team or sometimes some guys change around a little bit but not often. So yeah, as soon as I went to Jumbo I was given my trainer. But in terms of the relationship between the trainer and myself, when I went to Jumbo it wasn't a whole lot different than what I'd experienced with Andrew, which was the great thing. Like I said, some trainers I'd had in the past were really good trainers but they were also coaching 30 or 40 people. So they're not always going to be as quick to respond to a text message. Obviously then, you know, others were also working, working jobs on the side of well, you know, the coaching was their, was their sort of passion, hobby sort of thing and they were still working full time jobs. So you can't expect them to reply to a message all the time. Whereas with Yambo it's the exact same structure as I think each train has given about Five or six athletes and, you know, if I wake up in the morning and I've got a bit of a cold message, the trainer straight away. And you get a message back within half an hour. Yep.

All right, let's.

Let's adjust the schedule or anything like that. So I think it wasn't. I didn't find much of a change between going from Andrew and. And my trainer at Yumbo. I mean, the training philosophies, I'd say changed a little bit, but in terms of the communication and the support I had, it wasn't really any different.

So take us back to that moment where you actually got. You got the call. I don't know how did it even work? Did you get an email or a message or a call from someone from Yumbo to say, we want to sign you? And how did that feel?

Yeah, I mean, it's a tricky. It's a. It's a bit more complex than what you'd think. But, yeah, basically I. After I won Savoir, I. I sort of, yeah, thought, hopefully I'll get a pro contract here. And Andrew had already been in contact with a few. A few teams or a few teams had contacted him, sort of saying, yeah, we're interested in this guy. But it took a lot longer to actually eventuate. You know, when you're super excited and you want a pro contract. I was just for a week stressing out that I wasn't going to get anything and had a conversation with a couple teams and, yeah, everything seemed very positive, but in my mind, I just wanted to have something locked in and, no, I was going to be a professional cyclist. So that took a little bit longer. But then, yeah, I remember I got a call one night from my manager and he said, oh, Jumbo are offering you a contract for the next two years.

What stage was this of the. In the year? Was this at the end of the season?

No, this was. This was in July sometime. So obviously it was also tricky with the teams because, you know, their focus is the Tour de France. And I'm thinking, hey, just give me a. Give me a professional contract. I want to be a professional. And, yeah, they're busy, busy trying to win the biggest bike race in the.

World, especially with Jonas there.

Yeah, yeah. Well, at the time they were. I remember watching it, I think a couple days before they. They won the team time trial. And I think, I think that year Stephen Kreisberg was third overall, if I remember correctly. So, yeah, a bit before Jonas, but yeah, they were still going.

Well, what, what Was the structure of your contract was we want you to do a specific role in this team. And. And then what was your first race?

No, the. I mean, there's no real specificity in the contract. Exactly. But obviously from. From the past races and what. What I was. What I saw as my strengths on the bike. I thought I was coming into the team as a, you know, a. Pretty, well, in a support role, as a bit of a climber sort of thing. So, yeah, my first race with the team would have been Tour down under with the actual whole squad, which was pretty awesome. Getting to do your first. First pro race for the new team in on your home training roads. So I was pretty lucky. That big advantage as well, doing that.

Because, yeah, it takes away a bit of the nerves when you went across what was the training structure like? They obviously put you on their training structure. Can you go through some specifics of what a normal week would look like in the lead up to. Into your first race into that Tour Down Under? And what were the differences between anything different between what they wanted you to do and what you were doing?

Yeah, I mean, structure wise, I'd say pretty. Kind of pretty similar. Yeah, I did notice I probably backed off the intensity a bit on my endurance days compared to what I had been doing. And also, yeah, it was, yeah, different in a way. Like, obviously Jumbo has their philosophies on how to train, which is different than what I even train now. So normally within. Within a week, I'd say I'd do a session with some shorter sprints or something like that. I'd always do a session within the week that was sort of hitting that BO2 sort of area. And then the rest of the training was more specific to what was coming up, if that makes sense. So, yeah, if you're training for Nationals and Tour down under, which is relatively shorter stages and shorter climbs, that looks a lot different to when you're training for something like the Giro.

That's really good and interesting, that something like Bunnyong course, where you've got a repeated climb, how many times you're doing it? 16 times? 8, 7 minutes, 6 minutes. Is that something you would specifically do leading up into the Nationals in the past?

For sure. Like, I remember it was pretty notorious amongst all of us guys in like, ISOA or Swiss Wellness, whatever the team was called at the time. Bennelong. We all got given this crazy, crazy hard day, which we'd normally go do sort of a national simulation, like 14 repeats of sort of six to seven minutes of climbing and I did that for maybe two or three years into nationals and it was always a bloody hard day, obviously doing 14 or something, intervals of six to seven minutes. But yeah, once I moved across to Yumbo, yeah, nothing like that. It was more, more doing a couple targeted intervals around the same duration as Bunning Young and looking at, you know, where you might need to make accelerations and that. But yeah, it wasn't as full on as doing a full, full race before the race.

I'd say excuse our, we might jump around a little bit here, but we're just going to badge you with a fair amount of training questions because it's just so f. And it is super helpful for all the amateur cyclists out there and because of the reason you said before, there's just so many myths around, what are the pros actually doing? And like you said, a lot of it's exaggerated so we really want to get some specific answers. So when you say with Yumbo, you'd probably do a bit more, a couple of specific targeted efforts, maybe a little bit higher than what the 14 efforts would be because you're practicing an acceleration. How many is that specifically? Is it three seven minute efforts or is it five? And is it, you know, 150% above kind of what you'd expect to do on a normal lap of that race?

Yeah, yeah.

How does that look?

Yeah, again, I think my. Yeah, we change the preparation a little bit each year but I mean, I think. Yeah, hard to remember specifically. But yeah, one of the sessions that was to simulate more the nationals say I might do, do something like two minutes, you know, really in that VO2 range and then settle back into like a sort of high threshold straight after the two minutes and then you know, maybe finish the last 30 seconds with a sort of all out, whatever's left in the legs sort of thing. But yeah, it was, yeah, I would have said even then it was probably only doing maybe four or something intervals like that. Obviously they were super intense. But it wasn't. Yeah, it wasn't anything like the 14 in the past.

And then what about this year? What's. Have you done any race simulation sessions or.

I did something quite similar earlier this week on the Monday, which yeah, again is like a two minute sort of spike, really quite solid and then settling into a really, really hard tempo. So yeah, in that aspect quite similar. But I think, yeah, I think I'll have a few more sessions like that sort of simulating nationals, which also works well for Tour down under because there are, you know, something like corkscrew and Mount Lofty, they're kind of similar, short, shorter type intervals than what we get in some of the bigger races in Europe.

So exactly that. How does that look when you're preparing for the Giro or the Tour of Spain when they've got, you know, potentially 50 minute climbs, an hour climb, hour and a half climb? How's your training looking for those specific events as a Tour, when you're expected to be on the front for a period of time, to be leading the team or maybe half the climb or for as long as you can? What is your training looking like there for those specific efforts?

Yeah, I mean, I did a, I did a really good altitude camp this year. I was meant to do, meant to do the Giro. Unfortunately I didn't do it because I got covered about five days before, but I did an altitude camp. So the preparation was obviously a bit different than what I do, what I do now in, in the lead up to National. So yeah, like you said, when you're looking at those super long climbs within, within a session on the altitude camp, I, you know, I could have been doing as much as a 30 minute, 30 minute interval on a climb still sort of just, yeah, I guess simulating the same as what we'd have in a race. And yeah, you sort of touched a bit more on the, on the zones that they sometimes stick away from a little bit at other times of the year. Because, you know, in a Grand Tour and specifically the way we're racing these days, you're going to spend quite a lot of time in that, you know, not endurance or not threshold, but it's that sort of uncomfortable, uncomfortable sort of tempo zone.

And are they measuring how you're progressing with regards to the specificity of the race? So when you're doing these efforts and you're coming up to the Giro, are they then giving you, you know, an hour threshold climb test or something, or are they measuring you in the lab or the same thing for an opposite kind of race? How do they know if you're actually inform for that effort and that you can cope with the load required?

I mean, I think the, the sort of gold standard for it would be, would be lactate testing. So yeah, I think you'll find most good teams and good guys these days will test lactate throughout the season. So I mean, I think most, most, most World Tour teams are on camp at the moment and I think that'll be, you know, one day of, one day of the training camp there will be, you know, let's do the Lactate testing, get the guys baseline, and then throughout key points of the year, they'll, they'll retest and see. All right, are we progressing in the right way or, you know, do we need to change the way that we're training? Because we're not getting the adaptation that we're looking for. So I'd definitely say that's the gold standard. But obviously not everyone has access to doing lactate testing, so we're, we're only.

A couple of weeks or three weeks out from the Nationals Road race here in Australia for those listening to the podcast. And so this is kind of a question on that. How are you tracking. How's your lactate testing, tracking for. For this, for this event yourself?

Yeah, good, actually. I've, I definitely feel like I'm in a pretty good spot at the moment in terms of shape. And yeah, everything's been coming pretty. I wouldn't say natural. It's never. You always got to work a bit for it. But, you know, I'm haven't had any sessions where I'm not able to complete the session or anything like that. So I think I've had a pretty nice progression. And yeah, I feel like I'm in good shape and still got a little bit of time to do that last, last little bit of tweaking.

What does the National Australian Road jersey title mean to you?

I mean, I'd love to have it one day for sure. It'll be. Be awesome. Especially just to think, you know, you can wear the, the Aussie jersey over in a full season in Europe would be. Would be pretty special. And yeah, obviously moving from jumbo to bike exchange, it's a massive focus for us to get the jersey. So, yeah, it'll be. Be an important, important race for us. And, you know, I mean, I'd love to have it, but end of the day, if it's one of my teammates who are in it as well, I'm also, also going to be super happy.

We don't want to pry too much into the tactics of bike exchange, but are you an opportunity waiting to happen in the race? Is that the tactic or is the, is the goal behind Matthews, for example? Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about how the team's aiming for this race?

If I'm going to be completely honest, I got no idea.

So.

I mean, I think, yeah, at the moment, obviously everyone knows, knows the data, Nationals know we need to be in good shape and I think we'll rock up on the, on the weekend. And yeah, obviously, obviously the team and the directors have a pretty good overview of what everyone's doing and how everyone's shape is and, and yeah, as well as who else is on the start list and what's the best way for us to, to win the jersey. So yeah, that'll all, all be worked out a bit closer.

And this, this might be a bit of a weird question, but when you're on a team like Yumbo, do they respect the nationals, the Australian Nationals, knowing that that's something you really want to do or are you just at the whim of them and they say that's not important to us. You need to concentrate on training for the races we want.

Nah, Yummo were always super supportive and I always used to say, yeah, I like starting my year with nationals and I enjoy the race and I'd really like to get the jersey. So they were always super supportive of that and always, yeah, we'd sort of fit being in good shape at the nationals into my start of season race program. So yeah, it was always, you know, I'm going to be in good shape relatively early compared to some of the guys in Europe who have probably had a bit of a longer, longer winter there and not done, you know, not got back into proper training quite as soon as I. So yeah, it was always like, okay, if you're in such good shape, then we'll send you to UAE Tour and then you'll have a little bit of opportunity there. So now they made it work really well this season.

Coming in with Bike Exchange, do they have a plan that this is the races that you would expect to do from January through to October and you work backwards from that? Or is it just see how you go sort of idea how are they structuring your year and do you have much input into that?

Yeah, I mean, I'd say more and more nowadays. I mean, speaking for, I've only only been with Jumbo previously and now with Bike Exchange, but I think there always is a bit of an overview of the season where, where you'd sort of like to, you know, what races you will do. And yeah, that can change massively. Especially nowadays with COVID and all this stuff. Yeah, changes a heap. Like last year obviously mean it meant meant to do the Giro and that didn't happen. And I wasn't meant to do the Volta Espana, but I ended up doing the Volta Espana, so. So it does change a little bit. Obviously you, you have a bit of, a bit of a program that's set out by the team and yeah, you try Try and get to all those races. But, yeah, obviously, things can change, is your aspiration.

Sorry, let's cut out, George. Your aspirations for the Tour, is that something that you want to. You want to be a part of?

Oh, I'd definitely love to do the Tour de France one day. I mean, I think. I think every Aussie rider wants to do it especially. Yeah, for me. I sort of got into the sport because of the Tour de France and also within Australia. You know, if you tell someone, Someone asks you what you do for a living and you say, I'm a professional cyclist, they say, oh, do you. Do you do the Tour de France? I'd love to be able, say one day, yeah, I did the Tour de France.

So is that a realistic opportunity for you this year?

I hope so. I mean, obviously, that's out of. Out of my control to. I don't decide who goes to the race, but, yeah, I put my best foot forward, and if it's. If it's an opportunity to go there, then, yeah, for sure I'll work hard and get myself into shape and try to do it.

We really want to ask you about your two Grand Tour experiences so far. It's just the. The toughest races in the world. And you've done two or three of them. We've started two or three of them.

Only one.

Well, you started the Giro, right?

Yep. Sorry, sorry.

I've.

I've done done a little bit of the Giro and.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, tell us about that Giro experience. Obviously, it didn't go to plan, but you got to start it.

Yeah, that. I mean, that whole year was pretty. Pretty chaotic when. When Covid first sort of took over the world. And, yeah, I remember coming back to Australia for quite a long period of time because we had no idea if or when we were going to race. And then all of a sudden, the. The revised season got put on. I went back to Europe and then, yeah, it was sort of just pretty, you know, doing races in pretty quick succession. And still, at the time, I didn't have. Didn't have a Grand Tour on my schedule. But as it turned out, if I remember correctly, I think Stevie had a crash in the Dauphine, maybe leading into the Tour, and I think he dislocated or broke his shoulder. So instead of going to the Tour, he then decided to target the GC at the Giro. And so they changed the team a little bit. Needed some more guys to support in the. In the climbs. So, yeah, I got called into that, which was pretty awesome because I did my first proper altitude training camp with the team and then, yeah, from there it was into the Giro and we, we got to the first rest day and then I remember a knock on the door pretty early in the morning saying someone had gone positive for Covert and we all had to be retested. And then, yeah, we. We went to the start line in the bus and decided that we, we wouldn't, wouldn't take part in the race anymore. And then, then drove to a hotel and then I drove back to Spain that night.

It was a wild juror, that one, because there was just riders falling off everywhere. And was that the year that Ben o' Connor was up there or. It was dry as well, because it was just. There was all these young kids who hadn't had Covid competing at the top because a lot of the favorites had pulled out.

Yeah, I think that was the year that Tao Gaganhart won. Won the overall.

Yeah.

And Jai was, Took it from. Jai was. Jai and Wilco were teammates and they were both going really well on the GC as well.

Yeah, that's right.

But yeah, Ben, Ben was also. I think Ben won a stage and the day before he won the stage, he was also in the break and looked like he was going to win the stage and just, just didn't quite win it. So, yeah, yeah, it was a pretty, pretty hectic race, that one.

Yeah, so you didn't get to finish, but then last year you got to do the Vuelta and you got to experience winning a stage in a Grand Tour with the team's time trial. So take us through that whole Tour.

Yeah, yeah, so, I mean, yeah, it doesn't even feel that long ago, but yeah, so I did the Vuelta this year, which wasn't on my, my schedule, but again, Primoz crashed out of the Tour and then there was a bit of a question mark whether he was going to be in shape in time for, for the Vuelta. And then he sort of gave the team the all clear that he thought he was going to be ready to go. And yeah, another guy who was meant to do it unfortunately had a bit of a niggling injury and they, they, they chucked me in there instead of him, which was a pretty cool experience. And yeah, like you said, especially to win the. Win the team time trial to start, start the race was awesome, especially being sort of the home team because we're in the Netherlands. And yeah, we had all the support and yeah, it was pretty, pretty amazing experience.

How did you feel you coped with the team's time trial? And you are no slouch as a time trial. You've, you've been on the podium at the Australian individual time trial, the nationals. How did you feel you went?

Not too bad. I mean, it's very nerve wracking, especially when you're looking at the guys that you're meant to chop off with, with Rohan, Dennis, Primoz, Rugwich, Edofini. It's, it's a bit daunting in a way. And yeah, even the way the course was throughout the day, it was sort of on and off rain and you're thinking, oh, I don't want to be the one that goes through a corner a bit too quick and brings down the whole team. So, yeah, it is pretty, pretty nerve wracking. But the great thing was we had guys like Rowan in the team who he'd been a part of bmc, which they'd been pretty dominant in team time trials over the years. So, you know, we were sort of coached by Rowan and, you know, the process of how we do things and what's the fastest way to do everything and, and that, that helped me a lot mentally, just because we had such a clear plan of how we were going to execute this team time trial that, yeah, we got through all the tricky stuff. And then it was more like, all right, now you just got to suffer for as long as possible.

And how specific does the plan go? Does. Do you. Does everyone allocated kind of length of turns depending on your ability? You know, you should try and be in the front for 20 seconds, 40 seconds, even less. How does that all play out?

It's pretty simple actually. It's stay on the front, but if you are bringing down the speed, get off the front. So, wow. Basically it sort of means like, unless you can go as quick as Rowan, get out of the way. So, yeah, it's, it's pretty simple in that sense. But yeah, for sure, the, the start of the time trial when the world tour was quite technical, you know, we went off the start ramp pretty quickly. We had a right hand turn and then, you know, speed bumps and all that. So the first part of the time trial, we actually had a pretty clear plan of like, I, I remember I started. So my job was to start, get around the right hand corner, get up to speed again, and then get out of the way and let Rowan really get us up to speed. And then, yeah, from there it was sort of, Rowan gets to this bit, next guy takes over. So we had a very clear plan until we got more out onto the open roads and Then once we got there, it was more just who had the legs and keeping the speed and making sure we kept the speed all the way to the finish.

It's an amazing insight. I want to keep hammering home some of the key points of being part of a pro team. And we have heard that Yumbo have one of the strictest diet protocols among pro teams. Like, for you to confirm if that's true or not. And then what is that experience? Like, how did your nutrition change, being with them?

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't say. I don't think strict's the correct word. I mean, I'd say they're very structured, but also in the sense that, you know, you can get a lot of support. I think that's one of the. One of the really cool things about Yumbo is they've got a lot of the. Yeah, they've got a lot of guy, well, people within the team to really help you if there's something you need to work on. So for sure, for a rider like me, it's. Yeah, if you're. You're meant to go to a race and support a Grand Tour rider, then a lot of it's power to weight. So if you need some help with dropping a little bit of weight but doing it in the correct way, then, yeah, we've got the. Got the nutritionist there who's. Who's really, really nice, helpful guy who will give you all the time in the world to. To help you hit your sort of goals and. But yeah, for sure, they're also. I think it's one of the reasons they're so successful is they. They have what they call the food coach. So there's basically chefs at pretty well every race, and we all have an app on our phone and we get given. Given what we're having per meal. And pretty much you don't even have to think, which is kind of nice when you're pretty tired from racing. But basically you get your portions, go up to the. To the dinner or whatever it is, the buffet, everything's laid out there for you and, you know, how much you need to take of everything, which I'd say, you know, everyone puts it into. Everyone always tries to make it about, you know, being lean or being light and all that. But I think the most important thing about that is actually being well fueled and being able to recover. I think that gets forgotten a bit sometimes.

So is the app just telling you how much you need to eat? The app says you need to go get this so you can go up to the buffet and say, okay, this is. And it's the minimum that you need to eat to make sure that you're refueled and going to be able to recover.

Yeah, I mean, basically they're, I mean, no sim, no different, I guess, from people tracking it themselves with my, my fitness power or something. You basically have roughly what your, what your metabolic rate is. So they have an idea of what that is. And then when they go and look at the stages, they can roughly calculate. All right, we're going to be racing for this amount of time. We reckon it's around this amount of power. So we can work out within a pretty, pretty good. Yeah, within touching distance of what the calories are going to be. And then they structure the, the whole day around that. And also we're quite. Wow, it's quite a good system in, you know, obviously they have the breakfast and the recovery meals prepared, but, you know, if you need to, if you need to add some calories for the dinner, they'll recalculate because maybe you've had a harder day on the bike. So they can recalculate and you'll take a bigger, a bigger dinner or vice versa. If a stage is easier than what, what was predicted, you can, you can have a little bit less for dinner.

Do you, do you find, Chris, that if you get hungry, are you allowed, Is it okay to go for, for more or is there a restriction there?

I mean, yeah, they're not, they're not, you know, over your shoulder saying, like, hey, yeah, that's enough food.

This is enough.

Can't eat. I mean, at the end of the day, we're, yeah, I'm 28 years old and if I'm hungry, I'm not going to, not going to have someone tell me, mate, you can't eat any more food. So, yeah, I mean, it is. I think that's the great thing about Yamboin as well, is there's the tools there to help you achieve what you want. But also, you know, you're still, you're not a robot, you're a person. And you've also got to, got to work things out a little bit for yourself or, you know, get the support when you need.

It must be pretty cool to be part of that experience when you spend a fair few years dreaming about it, not sure what's going to happen, almost quitting, and then now you're here and this is your pro life. You know, you've got a food coach, you've got, you know, five potential trainers looking at Your data, you're on a pro team riding the best races in the world. It must be pretty surreal.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, yeah, it's sort of what you work towards is, is getting to that, that top level in the sport and being able to compete in the races that you, you'd just been watching on tv and yeah, for sure. It's, it's nice that it's. Yeah, like I said in the past, obviously you're still working bloody hard, but you're also not, not really making any money from, from all this effort that you're putting in. Whereas now, yeah, obviously you're getting an income from also doing. What's your passion? I guess.

So we're really interested in kind of tying it all together. I just want to kind of put a lot of the information we spoke about the last 20 minutes into an example for people and people would be so interested in what's a day in the life look like. So if you picked one of your hard training days, especially, I'm going to say when you're in Europe, potentially at altitude camp or just a hard training day, preparing for a race, what, what kind of time are you training? What time are you getting up? What are you eating for brekkie? Are you on your own? Are you with training mates all the time or the coaches are leaving you to, you know, be in Spain somewhere training by yourself? Can you walk us through a typical day in their life?

Yeah, I guess I could use Tenerife as an example this year, preparing for the Giro. That's probably the easiest. Yeah. So typically wake up in the morning for me, I normally get up really well. Not in Europe. I actually change a little bit to Australia. Everything's a bit later in Europe. So, yeah, not super early, but I think I'd be having, having breakfast around 7:30 or 8 from memory. So, yeah, we've, we've got a good setup at this hotel that also knows, you know, that's where everyone goes to do their altitude training. So they know you want pretty cycling specific sort of thing, sort of things. So. But also we've got a swan year there, so they'll go and buy the oats and all that sort of thing. So for me on Tenerife it was sort of wake up in the morning, head down to brekkie. I think most days I'd have, have some porridge with some fruit and yogurt and then maybe some like rice cake sort of, or like rice, not cakes, but, you know, crackers, things with, with maybe some like deli type meats or something like that or yeah, some, a bit of juice or something like that. Just depending on how, how many hours we had on the bike then. Normally I think most days we'd leave for training around 10. But yeah, if we're doing a six or a seven hour day we might leave at 9:30, go a little bit earlier then yeah, out on the bike for training. Depending on the session we might stop for a, for a coffee somewhere or on the really long days we'd stop and a couple guys would get a what they call a boccadillo which is just basically a, a big sandwich with, with cheese, tomato and ham or that sort of thing. Then yeah, back, back from training normally a recovery shake. Go and have your shower and all that and then back down for lunch which was normally either a, some rice with veggies and meat or, or we'd have a pasta dish, something like that. Especially on the bigger days, the recovery days it would probably be a bit different and then yeah, same for dinner is head. Well in the afternoons you'd sort of relax and on the camp there every second day we'd have massage with the, with the swan year and then you sort of just had the, had that afternoon free to do whatever you wanted. And yeah, head down for dinner again which again would be kind of specific on what the training you had done and what you were doing the next day. And then yeah, relax, chill out in your room with your roommate and then wake up and do it all again the next day.

You're asking for.

I was going to say yeah. Was there much on those camps? Were you doing much specific strength and conditioning extra stuff or are you just there to ride your bike and train specifically for the bike?

Most of it. Well, I mean as far as like a program that we were given, it was just a bike program. Obviously some guys like to do a bit of, you know, I'd say it's not really strength in terms of your lifting weights or anything but more you know, mobility and that sort of stuff. Some exercises just to, just to keep yourself strong. So yeah, some guys are good at doing that. Some do nothing. Same with, you know, some guys enjoy stretching in foam rolling in the afternoon, other guys do nothing. I think all of that stuff from what I've experienced is more sort of personal preference.

Well, I'd like to finish off by kind of asking. You mentioned at the very start you do, you're doing kind of two day block rest day, then three day block. Can you give us an insight into what those Days look like what's the general structure and what training sessions are you doing?

Changes pretty, pretty often. But yeah, I'd normally, normally do maybe within the two day. It'll be sort of one, one intense day with some intervals in there and then the following day will probably more be like a long endurance ride. And then at this time of year I quite enjoy doing strength and conditioning. So I work with a guy in Adelaide. So in the morning I'll go and do about 45 minutes of strength and conditioning with him and then get home and head out on the bike for a, for a long ride.

And then the, I guess let's say last week in a three day block. Can you take us through those training sessions?

Yeah. What did I do?

You don't have to by the way.

If it's, if it's no, no secret that in mind. I just can't remember. I'll give you as a better example, I'll do my last little block so that's a bit easier to remember. So yeah, the Monday I did a four hour ride with some, with like sort of four six minute efforts, then the rest of the ride just, just sort of in that, yeah, in that endurance zone. And then yesterday I did, did strength and conditioning in the morning. Then just an endurance ride which ended up being about five and a half hours. And then actually just because we haven't had much heat here in Adelaide yet, I got straight off the bike and into the sauna for half an hour, 30 minute sauna and then that's me done for the day.

Fantastic. Look, I know a lot of the people will be really angry with me if I don't talk about your experiences with some of the best bike riders on the planet. With Woot Van Aert and Primos Roglic in your team, did they do anything specifically special to make them the riders that they are, that you could say, wow, I need to be doing some of that or yeah, just give us your experience with being around those people.

I think everyone's looking for that little, you know, what makes this guy so special. And I, I, in my experience, I mean, I'm not sure, maybe they're just you know, genetically a little better or something like that. But for me the one thing that sticks out is they're all, you know, pretty consistently hard working athletes. Yeah, they're not. Yeah, they all, all when they're locked in and focused on training, they all, you know, doing the little things to make, make sure they're in the best shape possible and you know, the Little things. I mean, is, yeah, doing your training correctly, but sticking to the program, not, not under doing it, not overdoing it. They're all really good with their nutrition if they know they need to drop a bit of weight before a Grand Tour there, you know, working with the nutrition is super hard to drop weight. But I think the main thing is, you know, it's just consistency more than anything. You know, there's nothing special in my opinion. It's just day, day in, day out, doing what's required rather than everyone sort of sees it as, you know, something, some sort of crazy session or stuff like that. It's, it's not really that. It's more just. More just the consistency of doing the hard work. And yeah, I think that that adds up more than anything else.

You can't say that any professional rider would be more mentally tough than other people. Everyone looks at you guys as the, you know, the top toughest athletes in the world because of the demands on you. But was there anything mentally that you noticed about a Woot or a Primos or a Jonas that made them different? Or they, it's their combinability that allows them to do that, combined with some mental toughness. But it's no more than anyone else in the peloton.

Yeah, I mean, you don't know. I guess it's hard to say. You never know how much these guys have to suffer or whether they're Primos is pretty funny for it. He'll always, always tell you that he's suffering and he can't believe how hard everyone's riding. But yeah, then he goes and whoops everyone's ass in the stage. So he's pretty funny. Funny actually. But yeah, I don't think it's something like they can suffer more than anyone else, I think. I think, yeah, they're just talented bike riders. You know, they're confident in their ability as well. And I think, yeah, especially someone like Primo Sue's been, been doing it. I think the Volta was a good example this year. He, he came into the VO a bit underdone for sure. Even he said that himself. But, you know, he knew he was going to grow into the race and, and we were starting to see that as well. I think there was a day that he, he got dropped by Remco, but, you know, instead of beating himself up or sort of saying, ah, there goes the Vuelta sort of thing, he's like, oh, no, you know, I didn't have a good day today. I can see that in the numbers. But I'm going to get better in the third week and that's where I can make the difference. So, yeah, I think it's just experience and confident in their ability and also they know they've done the work, they know they're good bike riders, so they. Yeah, I mean, they also love to win as well.

So.

Just on a personal side, Chris, what. What are you. What are you aspiring to in the next year for yourself? What. What are your goals? What. Where do you want to take your journey now with the new team and how's your motivation levels? What are you looking to do this year? Have you got anything in particular that that's in your back of your mind that you. That you really want to achieve?

Yeah, I mean, I think continue to sort of progress and. Yeah, get some more. More consistency. I mean, with. With the last couple years with COVID and also I had a. Quite a bad injury the following year, which ruined a bit of my season. And yeah, this year missing. Missing the Giro with COVID I think for me, I hope to get a bit of a more consistent year under my belt and continue to progress. I felt like when I was able to get a good training block and then into some races, I felt like I was able to progress quite, quite quickly, or not quickly, but, you know, you can make a bit more progression when you're on and off all the time with these little setbacks. So, yeah, I think I want to continue developers, yeah, a good climber and continue to work on my time trial as well, which can be a big asset. I mean, obviously coming to a. Yeah. At the Vuelta, I was there to support Primos and I think coming to Bike Exchange, it'll now be to support someone like Simon Yates. So, yeah, I think if, if, yeah, continue to work on the things that I have been the past couple years and yeah, try support someone like that in the biggest sort of races.

We've been super generous with your time. We won't keep you any longer. It's been a long episode and we thank you for being so open and generous with your answers because we have been grilling you.

As I said, thanks for having me.

Yeah, definitely. And yeah, it's been an amazing insight. Some of the answers I really didn't expect, so just definitely dispelling some myths around pro cycling. Anything else from you, dad?

No, thanks so much, Chris. We're really looking forward to. Hopefully you get some success and you do get to wear that coveted green and gold jersey one day. And we'll all be on your side, mate. And can't wait to see what happens. And when this episode comes out, unfortunately, it's the post this race. So it'll be very interesting to see how things pan out for you. And this particular event that you're that's coming up so close now. So good luck, and I really hope you have a great day at the nationals. And you never know unless you're in there, do you, what's going to happen next?

Yeah, thank you very much. I mean, got to be in it to win it. So we're off to a good start. Let's see how see how the rest of the day pans out. Thanks again, mate.

And that is it for this episode. As always, thanks to everyone for listening. And we'll see you on the next one. It.