Our Review: Le Tour de France So Far!!

Welcome to a special edition of the Trivello Coaching Get Fast podcast today. This is a special Tour de France edition of the podcast because we just cannot contain ourselves. We love this race so much that we want to talk about the race throughout this three weeks that it is on. So the normal podcast episodes from the Get Fast podcast will be released on Tuesdays as normal, but we will be recording these extra to an event Tour de France episodes throughout these three weeks when we really want to talk about something. Because we just love the race so much and we know that a lot of you out there love it as well. These episodes will be audio only. We won't be filming the video because our aim is to just record them quickly in the morning after a stage and get the episode out to you so there's no delay. Sometimes if we record an episode but we don't release it until the next week, another five days of stages has happened. So the Tour de France, it's come round again, and what an epic spectacle it is. I feel like a kid at Christmas every year when it rolls around, and I can't believe how excited I still get waiting for the stage to start each night when SBS turns on that Tour de France music, he gets Mike Tomolaris, Robin McEwen, Dave McKenzie, everyone sitting there, all the commentators that we're so used to, that we've grown up listening to talk about the race, it just gets me giddy with excitement. It's an unbelievable three weeks of racing, isn't it?

Yeah, I suppose the Giro does that to me as well. And I can't differentiate between those two Grand Tours. I love the Giro because it's like 21 stage races that are one day classics. And the Tour to me, has always been probably a little bit more scripted, but this year started with an unbelievable bang. And it's got me excited because I just love seeing guys risking everything and paying off. Like stage one and two and three, you know, breakaways, and two out of the three won. It was amazing.

Yeah. Yeah. So we've had five stages so far of the Tour, and as you said, every stage has just come out with a bang. It's brought its own bit of drama and not all of the drama. Positive. We do like some drama, we do like some excitement. But there was some really horrible things happening in the first stages, which we'll touch on, but they've been covered extensively. But I want to start by saying there is actually a member of the Donnelly family in this year's Tour de France, and that is mum Andy Donnelly, your wife, My mum, your wife.

Just wondering where you're going there.

And she. I really wanted to mention this. She follows a lot of the teams on Instagram. She loves keeping up with the race from that perspective, from the behind the scenes. And before the Tour, she, you know, Jumbo Visma had a poll competition to vote on the jersey that they were going to wear because they needed to change their jerseys, which I agreed with because it was too close to the yellow jersey. They've got so much yellow on them and mum voted for the correct jersey and anyone that voted for the jersey that they ended up wearing got their name on the jersey. So Andy Donnelly has her name on the Jumbo Visma jersey and she's riding around France at the moment, so we're really excited about that.

Yeah, she's a Roglic fan and Sepp Kus Kuss is her favorite and actually she knows a lot about cycling over the journey, so it's great. She gives me all the stats as I'm watching, so it's a real team effort. Yeah, it is.

Yeah. She has so much behind the scenes knowledge, which is so helpful. It's like having Matt Keenan sit next to you on the couch. So let's get into these stories. So far, there's been some big stories. We'll touch on the crashes. I don't want to talk about them too much because, to be honest, after Stage three, after Caleb Ewan crashed out, I just was completely flat. I was just devastated watching everything unfold there. The fact that the crashes from the previous two days just made you kind of sick. And then Roglich.

Thomas.

Yeah, Thomas. And then Ewan was the final straw and it just was really disappointing and not enjoyable. You don't watch cycling for that.

No. The people you come to watch and they end up on the ground, it's part of cycling. And Caleb took it really well. And the way he backed up and jumped on the bus and encouraged the guys the next day, I think that was fantastic. That's a real team player. And, you know, it's not about me and I'm here to support you. And. And then I did see a photo of him on a Learjet going to get his operation, which was. Which is fair enough. But look, the crashes, you know, it's inevitable there will be crashes. And we have discussed the reasons why. There's more. And is it because the younger riders these days are more willing to take risks? I'm not sure. The older riders 20 years ago seemed to control the peloton a bit more and not tolerate risk taking from some of the brash young riders. And they would, you know, reprimand them if they saw them doing something that was dangerous. Is that still happening now? I'm not sure. I'm not in the peloton, I don't know. But it seems like. I mean, there's always been crashes. There's been crashes from day one in, you know, 1880 till now. So it's not like it's something that's new, but it just seems like there's more really bad crashes. And the speed of the bikes are so much faster than it used to be 40 years ago, without doubt. So the crashes end up with, you know, really serious injuries, and. And you're out of the Tour. And it's cruel, you know, day one, two, three or four, being out of the Tour after all the preparation you've done, it's. It seems so cruel.

Yeah, it's just frustrating. And there's been a lot of talk about course design and, you know, the. The Tour itself didn't make it safe for the r. The riders, you know, rebelling against it. There was that protest. But when it comes down to it, it is just frustrating because we're here to see this epic battle of most likely Roglich versus Poguchar versus Thomas, and now two of the three are, you know, battling injured, and it just doesn't seem fair.

And not only that, Ewan against Cavendish against. Yeah, the best sprinters. So now, you know, Ewan is arguably the best sprinter going round, and he could have won that stage, you know, in his incredibly good handle of the bike, and he ends up on his.

Back, which was probably the only crash.

That was more his fault, touching the wheel up front. But at the same time, the guy jumped out of his seat, which throws his bike back, which, you know, it's definitely the guy behind's fault, but that's how it happens when someone gets out of the seat and you know he's going to do that, so. And, you know, Sagan came down with him, and there's just so many riders who've come down. It's more who hasn't come down.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Anyway, we'll move on from the crashes, because, like we said, it's a negative topic that has been talked about enough, I think, and it is frustrating. And we just got to. It's just like the writers after. You just got to move on. And for me, the story of the Tour so far, and I did not think I would say this is Mark Cavendish. I think the redemption of Cavendish and the story of him getting here is inspiring. It gives you goosebumps to see all the footage. I just. That is what cycling is about. It was just an unbelievable story and, you know, he thought he was done. And coincidentally I watched an interview with him a month ago and there was talk of him potentially writing the Tour and he was getting quite aggressive at the journalists and saying, stop asking me if I'm writing the Tour. He was basically saying, I'm not good enough. You know that's not going to happen. And we know now that deep inside he did want to ride the Tour, but he was trying to shirk the journalists asking those questions. But don't forget, Quick Step also have the previous green jersey winner from last year in Sam Bennett. And he was saying, we've got, we've got last year's green jersey winner. There's no way I'm taking his spot. I'm not going to ride instead of Sam Bennett, so stop asking. And there was a little bit of anger there because deep down he did want to ride, but he did know that was the truth, that he's not as good as Sam Bennett anymore, so he's not going to ride the Tour de France. And then he said in some interviews recently in the last couple of days that he never thought he'd ride the Tour de France again. And yeah, from that interview a month ago to then, Sam Bennett not. I don't know exactly what happened and there is a story there whether he wasn't finding form and there is a bit of something happened. I don't know if it's politics or something with him not not making the team and being a bit out of form. He did an Instagram post saying that he was just not informed for the Tour, but I think there was something behind it. And Cavendish gets picked. And yeah, for this kind of turnaround, from Cavendish thinking that he's potentially never going to ride a Tour de France again, to getting to come back on the team and having the team not only getting into the Tour de France, but firstly, Quick Steps re signed him when no other pro team would sign him. Everyone thought he was done and washed up to on his first chance in a sprinting stage getting the win, it was just remarkable.

The irony is there's so much in it and I did hear a whisper that he had asked his DS what his Race B plan was in case Bennett didn't make the start line. So deep down he was telling the journalist one thing, but deep down he Was saying, well, if Sam's not up for it, have you got a plan B? Yeah, I'll be your plan B if you want. That's how determined he was. The last time he won a Tour de France win was with Quick Step at the same town, same venue. I just find that a little bit eerie. Different lead out train, but they delivered him incredibly. Quick Step are professionals at this. They. And Cavendish still has to make his way through the peloton finish, and he did beautifully. And I felt so sorry for the breakaway guy who got caught with 100 meters to go, even though it was exciting to see Cavendish win.

Brett Van Moore.

Oh, far out. 100 meters. And he, you know, with 100 meters to go, he was winning. Then he came 50th.

Yeah.

And if you look back at the stats, you'd say, oh, how'd you go on stage four? Came fift, but I was winning until 100 meters to go. No one would see that data. It would. It would not make any sense. You know, you didn't go so well. You came 50th. But getting back to Cavendish, I just think I see a new Cavendish now. Look, I didn't really like Cavendish. I think he was too brash for my.

I was the same.

And I mean, like, as an endurance athlete. I really like the marathon runners, endurance athletes, because they're. They've got level heads. This is my own opinion here.

I'm going to say something after this.

And the sprinters, they're just so cocky and brash and in your face, and that's probably what everybody loves about them because they're big risk takers and endurance athletes are more measured and conservative and I don't know what else, but I just. Anyway, you're spot on. But to see his character change from being an appreciative writer who's grateful to be given another opportunity, and he's taken it with both hands, and you can see the gratitude in his voice. He's in tears. It's emotional. He respects everything about it now. He's got so much more value to the event than he's ever had before. He won 30 races. This is 31 stages that he's won, which is close to Merckx's record. And I think this is probably the one that means the most to him. Probably. Except for the very first one. Everyone has a special feel to it for him, I'm sure, but he just has value for the race now, and he has it in context and understands how privileged he was to be given such opportunities as a young sprinter. And now I can see that he really looks back and says, wow, how lucky am I to be given another opportunity? And it just, the lesson is that, you know, believe in yourself, no matter what's happening, back yourself in, have confidence in your ability. You don't lose ability overnight. And in his case, five years since he last won a stage at the Tour de France. And it's never over. And there are great lessons in this for everybody, for the everyday cyclist or triathlete who's listening, or runner. This is something you have to really understand in your own mind that you have the ability to do whatever you want if you believe and you can make the unheard of happen. This is like a movie script. You could not say that's never going to happen. You know, a guy leaves the Tour, hasn't ridden for five years, hasn't won a, you know, up until this year, hadn't even won a race. Here he comes and wins a stage in the biggest race in the world. And you know, people go, that would never happen. That's, you know, that's too Hollywood style. But it did. It's real. And to me it's, I just think it's wonderful for the sport and I love seeing. It means so much to someone because to see someone genuinely, you know, the footage in the Quick Step dinner that night was fantastic. He's making a speech and he doesn't really know what to say. Everybody, he just wants to thank everybody. He's grateful. You know, the masseurs, the soign, yes, they're all a part of it. It's a team. And people forget that the Tour is about, you know, the winner, the GC winner, the sprint winner, the king of the mountain winner, the overall team winner. But it's the weirdest sport in the world because it's an individual sport. But you can't do it without your team. So he respects that part of it. And we were talking earlier about how good would the team members feel to see him win, that they just get as much joy because they've fulfilled their role. And listening to Mark Renshaw being interviewed the night before was fantastic because he was responsible for Cavendish winning over 50% of his races. And without Renshaw, Cavendish wouldn't have won the amount. And a lot of people forget who Renshaw is. And he was an incredible bike rider. He was the best at his role in the world. So Cavendish is the best sprinter for a period. Renshaw was the best lead out man.

You'd argue that Renshaw was one of the best sprinters as well, because he always came second. He was so good that Cavendish would roll over him, but he would still come second a lot of the time.

Although he had a little chance himself to. To be the winner of a team elite the. The sprint main man and didn't quite go his way. So it's interesting. You're good at a role and. But yeah, look, I could talk about Cavendish and how. How fantastic a story it is and who knows what's going to happen in the next 15 stages, 16 stages that are left.

Yeah, I think he's going to. He's going to win at least three stages and that is a big call to win three stages. And you could easily just brush that off and say, of course he is.

He.

He's a gun. But if he does that, it would just be the most miraculous story, George.

The way he won the intermediate sprint, that he had the power and speed that he used to have and his lead out, man.

Wow.

He took him straight to the lead and they won comfortably. Yeah, they almost. They got first and third.

Yeah. We'd argue that Bennett was so strong last year because of his lead out, man. Yeah, same team. So, yeah, it was from the moment he finished. These scenes were just so emotional. Like I said, I got goosebumps. He sat on the ground, he would just burst into tears, which you don't. You see, the old Cavendish was aggressive and angry and he had to be. You know, you've got to have that.

Cockiness to great seeing Greipel and guys come up and give him, you know, give him the accolades he deserved, you know, because they. They're trying to do the same thing. You know, they've passed their prime.

Yeah.

Yeah. They're in the race and they. They would love to. Gripel was in the top 10.

Yeah. Wind the clock back and.

But you know, you've got to take your opportunities when they. When they are handed to you. They're not handed to you when they arise. And he did. He had to make it happen. It wasn't handed to him on a platter. But wow, what a great story.

I'll touch on the cockiness of the sprinter because I just find the exact same thing in athletics. And this was always the case growing up. All the middle distance runners, we were all the skinny little kids, humble. Yeah. We liked having fun. And the sprinters were always the muscly big jocks. And the word I use is prance. They pranced around the track like they owned it. They'd be on their tippy toes and. And it was all about how they looked. And the sprinters in cycling are the same. They're the big, muscly jocks of it. And the middle, like you said with Dave McNeil when we had him on the podcast a few weeks ago, all the middle distance runners we get on are the most stoic, are the most humble and softly spoken. I just find that hilarious.

Least aggressive.

Yeah. And you watch the sprinting at the Olympics and watch it this year, the 100 and 200, and I just laugh at. Between on your marks and go is about. It's getting bigger and bigger every year. It's up to a minute, I reckon, because they're slapping their legs and they look down. It's a competition to see who can take the longest to get in the on your marks position.

I always say because the event's so short, they have to make the most of it, as compared to a 10,000 meter race where they're on there for half an hour. I think they're a bit jealous of only the time period they get.

Yeah, we'll stop hanging it on the sprinters, but you do have to, just.

Before we stop hanging on the sprinters. When I used to take you guys to training at the ass track, it used to crack me up. You guys were busting your asses doing, you know, 45 minutes of continuous intervals. And I watched the sprinters and they had taken their tracksuit off and bending over and kicking their legs and stretching their arms, and they basically did 15 seconds of effort and then had another 10 minutes off.

Which is, I mean, it is part of what they have to do.

Absolutely. I'm taking the piss.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But no, I, I, there was so many parts to the emotion that I loved just to finish off with Cavendish and the fact that with a K to go, a K and a half to go, they weren't going to catch Ben Moore. And everyone was looking at each other and they hesitated for a second. And the superstar that is Julian Alaphilippe just took it himself.

And selflessly, the green jersey went to the front.

He's the world champion. He doesn't have to ride for anyone else. And he just went, I'm taking this for Cavendish, and got them there. They wouldn't have caught the guy. I don't think that hesitancy could have cost them. And then, more importantly, he finished the line in like he said before, he was so happy for Cavendish. And they embraced it. A massive hug. And from that point on, you saw the behind the scenes Footage of the Quick Step staff members. They're all jumping up and down, screaming. And then Cavendish just spent the next few hours hugging everyone, and he just. He was. He couldn't stop crying and he was just hugging every team member. And that, you know, it was like he'd won the greatest cycling race in the history of the world, and that's just how much it meant to him. And like you said at the team dinner, he was pretty speechless and he just said it was. What an honour it was to ride with his team. And. And I really agree with you that this one would be one of the most special, because I think it's this theme that has just come up so much on the podcast for us and presence. And he's the most present for this one, because when he's younger, it's just. He's going about his career, he's trying to win as many things as possible, and then that's taken away from him for five years, and then he thinks he's never going to win the Tour de France, he's never going to race the Tour de France again. And he just looks back on those memories, thinking how amazing they were. And then he gets another chance. You know, being present so much in.

This stage, it's almost like when you're going through your career, you're not savoring the moments enough, and now he's got a chance to savor it, and he's not going to let that go because he thinks there may not be another one, which is quite possibly true. So I think that's a good lesson in itself, isn't it? Just smell the roses for a second after you've. You know, we talked about that with Dave McNeil, actually, that, you know, looking back on your career, you know, you're sort of on your journey and you up and going and. But, you know, just reflect, you know, on a good performance that's. That's worth doing. Soak it in for a minute or two and then move on.

Yeah, and the last thing on this is that he had the Cavendish statue, where it said 30 stage wins and he had the permanent mark and he crossed out and said 31. And then next to it, he put always believe. And. Yeah, I loved that. I just thought that is just so simple. But always believe.

Anymore after that.

Yeah, yeah. So, moving on to the other biggest story is the time trial and.

Can we just not go there to the time trial yet?

Yes, sure.

We haven't talked about stage one and two.

Sure.

Are we going to talk about that? At all or.

Yeah. What did you want to touch on with stage one and two?

The risk takers of Vanderpoelippe. Oh my God, that is gold to me. Alaphilippe, what a legend. He is. So good for cycling.

I'm in love with Alaphilippe.

To do what he did on that finish. Just to attack, risk everything against the best riders in the world on stage one of the Tour.

Yeah.

Was incredible. Just, just saying, okay, this is what I got. What have you got?

God, you're so correct. Because so much has happened. I just forgot how good stages one and two were. You said that then. And I went, what even happened in stage one and two? I remember was the crashes. But you're right, that attack was just.

End and he held. So he got a gap of 10 seconds and, and his boldness of risking everything and he maintained that they. Then he rode the same tempo as them.

Yeah.

So if he had stayed in the bunch, he would have been a bunch sprint. And. But he's just risked everything.

Yeah.

And, and he's managed. And then the next day, Vanderpoel coming out and, and doing it on the first lap and I was saying, oh, I'm not really sure what the tactic is here. I didn't understand that There was an 8 second time bonus and I thought, oh, that's pretty average of me not knowing that. And that's what he was doing. Plus he really butted them up because he put them in the red zone. And then the second lap to finish the race, he attacked them again, won the stage and got yellow. It was absolutely brilliant tactician. And you have to be some kind of rider to pull that off.

Yeah, yeah. And like he said, he had to be daring because while he tied everyone else out, he absolutely blew himself up to get that eight second bonus.

And I was questioning, what is he, what is he doing that for? But what a great move in hindsight. And it shows you, you know, there's so much that we don't know behind the scenes that's happening and what their tactics are. And it's a great example of, you know, trying to understand what's going on with every team and what their, what their goals and aspirations are.

Yeah, yeah. And I love that, you know, his initials are MVP and that's the nickname that's really getting stuck to him now because he's just a phenomenal rider all around and he really is the mvp.

It's funny, isn't it? Most valuable player Mark van der Poel.

Yeah. Matthew Vanderpoel. Yeah.

Mark's brother, Matthew.

Yeah. So you're right. The. Those two stages, just elite riding from two very daring riders and they're what make the sport so exciting. And I think you. You put it really well. You said out of three stages where there was, you know, breakaway attempts, two out of three, one and so.

And one only missed by 100 meters.

Exactly. Yeah. So. And all of them really just put in insane efforts to give themselves the best chance of winning. And that's all you can ask of yourself.

Yeah. Risk, reward. We talk about a lot in the podcast and look, it never normally happens this way, but in the first three stages, 66% risk reward and it nearly was 100% I felt so sorry for.

I was yelling at the tv, come on.

And at the same time, Cavendish got his exact. So there's so many good things happening in that stage. It would have been a great story either way, I think, think. But yeah, I just love people who are just gonna put everything on the line and it's sort of spitingly inspiring stuff to, you know, in our own local C grade race or D grade race or whatever we're doing, you know, it's the effort and the planning and the risk taking and they're all part of. Doesn't matter whether you're riding the Olympics, you know, the Tour de France or the local club race, it just absolutely doesn't matter. It's a tactical race that you have sorted out in your mind, and that's the challenge. And that's why we love to pin a number on.

Yeah, well, I'm almost always the most motivated and the most excited to ride the bike after any. Approaching any professional race, especially the Tour de France, you just, you just want to get on and go, go as hard as they do.

You know, I know we haven't mentioned this, we're not going to really talk about it, but watching Van der Poel in the time trial, protecting the yellow jersey and going around those corners at, you know, max speed, it was inspiring to hold onto it by six or seven seconds in the end. That, that's. It's another. There's another little story there. The value of the yellow jersey. And yeah, this is why we love.

The Tour and this is why we're doing some special podcast episodes on it, because there is so much to talk about. Always.

He just. He would never have time trialled like that. You know, if it had been. If he had have not been in yellow, he would have time trialed probably 30 seconds slower.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. But because the incentive and that tells us a lot about mindset. Yeah, we. If it means more to us, we'll try harder. Well, make it mean more to yourself every time, you know. Yeah, and I'm guilty of that. Yep. A lot. You know, some of our Thursday night club races that we're doing on Zwift, I'm getting dropped. You know, just try a bit harder.

And I won't get dropped. The reason I think a lot of our travel athletes love these Thursday night Zif races that we. We do and we spoke about last year in the podcast we over winter, because of COVID we started doing handicap races together and we've continued it this year because everyone loved it so much. Is because you can either do your normal Thursday hit session or you can replace it with a race. And both. Both options are fine, but the race is doing what we're saying. It's giving you that little bit of extra incentive to push harder. And you might just be getting a little bit more out of yourself in that compared to just a standard.

Never train as hard as the. As the training session that's on the program as compared to a competitive handicap. I'm not talking about crit races or road races. Handicap is where you have to ride a threshold in your group. There's a difference. And, and this is. This is really key to. But it's great to practice execution and to push yourself and challenge yourself in your, in your. In your little bunch.

So we digress a bit from the Tour but diving into the tunnel trial. So we'll stay on Vanderpoel for a little bit because he openly said, and I don't know if this was just for show, but I mean the facts say that it wasn't just for show that he said, I haven't done any time trial training because it's just not my specialty. And he's just been focusing on his. What's. What he's good at and what's special for him. And so last night they said they were up until midnight on the bike doing aero testing, doing position testing, trying to get himself right, trying to make sure he could maximise every second for the stage. And he came out and rode the time trial of his life and he actually said that it was the best time trial I've ever ridden.

So I absolutely love Van der Poel, Van Aert, all of those young new up and comers, but I think that was pathetic preparation. I am disgusted that he could possibly have lost the yellow jersey because his poor planning. Three months, four months out Knowing that he wanted to get yellow early. There was a time trial on stage five and he needed to be good at time trialing to defend his yellow jersey if he had it. That's really bad planning in my opinion.

Because there's two sides to this. Because I argue that, you know, he's trying to win one day classics, he's trying to win the Olympics. He's so focused on being that type of rider, he's not going to waste any time time trialing. But you're right if this was their goal to get the yellow and retain it.

And it just reminds me that you can't be a great triathlete and then a really good mountain climbing cyclist and a good 800 meter runner. They're completely different events. But we have some inquiries as to be coached for. I want to do. What's your goal? I want to, you know, run a.

Mountain, do the widest range of events.

Possible, be a really gun hill climber and, you know, do well as an ironman.

Yeah. Can you have me ready for the 10k fun run in October and the, you know, the Iron man in November?

Yeah. And so you're going to spread your effectiveness and I suppose that's the point we're making with Van der Poel is he was concentrating on the things that he thought were more important. But I am a big believer in time trialing will help you in any facet of your just, you know, being able to hold threshold for longer than anybody else at a higher power, at a higher speed is going to help you in one day races. Going to help you in classics, going to help you break away, going to help you in rolling turns, going to help you recover better. The best GC riders, the best time trialers and the best hill climbers. What's hill climb? It's a threshold ride. What's a time trial? It's a threshold ride. So they're not so good in the one day classics, but the Olympics you might need to be having to ride solo to the finish and you need your time trialling threshold.

Well, if he is doing what the rumours say and he's leaving the tour halfway through to go prepare for the Olympics, then it might have been a really good training session for him.

Exactly right. And we saw the world titles last year where both the male and female races were solo breakaways, 14k from the top of that climb to the finish and they had to time trial. So if they were poor at time trialing, they possibly have lost those two events.

Yeah. My last question on Van der Poel and SBS asked this great question. I just wanted to know your opinion on what's bigger for cycling, the Tour de France, Van der Poel's position right now with the yellow jersey or the Olympics. Because I find it pretty disrespectful that he's just going to leave halfway through, especially if he's in the yellow jersey, which we don't think he'd actually leave while he's in the yellow jersey.

That's a good question, isn't it? If he wanted to say they'd planned for him to leave the Tour in Stage eight and he still had yellow, would he just not ride hard that day and lose the yellow jersey? Because that would be disrespectful to the race. And I don't think it'd go down very well with anybody. I mean, I'd still question the sprinters who see that the Tour has no more sprint opportunities except for Champs elysees and there's 14 more stages where they're not going to be in the race at all, except, you know, possibly being the Lantern Rouge last place. And, you know, their incentive is stuff that I've only, you know, I'll live to fight another day at another event. And if there was some way of stopping people from starting the event and not finishing it, I would be all for it because I just find them awfully find it. They're not allowed to ride next year if they've, they've gone and left the event without a valid reason being injury or someone's ill in their family or something.

I don't know.

But it's just, it's like someone doing a road race and coming in and knowing they're not going to finish it, but attacking the race and making it hard for everybody and then just pulling out of the race, well, it's actually destroyed the event. I want people in the event who are going to finish so they're not going to do moves that they know have no consequences.

Yeah.

And I think that's a bad thing.

Yeah, absolutely. Because we always talk about it's a three week race, you have to measure your effort. And that applies more to the GC guys.

It does.

Lots of guys go out on the break knowing that it's going to ruin them for the next week because they're putting 150 kilometer effort.

I know it's a tough, tough one to work out how to do. But you know, at the end of the day, the events lose a little bit of their shine when people leave halfway through.

So what would your answer be? What's for cycling? What's bigger, the Tour de France or the Olympics?

Well, I think Greg van Avermaet, after five years of being in gold helmet, his gold helmet, I think he thinks that the Olympic Games is pretty much. But look, for me, the pure cycling, the Olympics, they weren't originally a cycling event and there's a lot of events in the Olympics that weren't the originals. And to me, like, I'm a purist, I just love athletics and that's what the Olympics are for me. The World Championships of cycling and the Grand Tours are the biggest things. It would be unbelievable to be the gold medalist at the Olympics, but. But I think that the Tour de Francello jersey and stage wins and the world title wearing those rainbow jerseys has so much more. And that's just my opinion.

Yeah, that's a really good answer.

But yeah, just love to be Olympic champion as well, wouldn't you?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, representing your country is always exceptional. Diving more into the time trial, Poga Char's performance last night was once again remarkable. And I think the best thing that sum it up was I saw someone had posted the image of Stefan Kung who came second, just watching on in horror as Poga Char destroyed his time by 18 seconds. And his face facial expression said it all. He was just devastated, you know, really thought this was his chance for a stage win. And they had that image and the image side by side from last year's final stage time trial at the Tour de France where Paul Guitar is destroying Roglic. Roglic is losing the Tour and Roglic's teammates, Tom Dumoulin and Wout Van Aert are sitting there watching it all unfold on the tv and their jaws are on the floor and their faces are just gobsmacked and they're in disbelief because they've just seen three weeks of hard work trying to get Rogic to the end be undone. And yeah, the comparison of the Kung image and the two youngboys next to each other just watching Poga Chai do it again, I think sums up the night.

What a great performance, what an incredible rider. And to see him so far ahead of the rest of the field. And he did that last year. He repeated what he did last year. And last year was a hilly finish. This one suited the stronger, bigger guys, which should have suited Van der Poel and Van Aert more than it suited.

Well, they performed unbelievably well. They were better than the GC guys. They did.

But he was class above.

Yeah.

Alan Piper is a remarkable ds. He has been instrumental in Poga Chars. And the guy who was leading the time trial prior to Kung early on in last night's stage was Poker Cha's teammate.

Yeah. Yeah. Crashed it in.

No, no.

Oh, that was his other teammate.

Yeah. But other guys speeding towards the end. But he set the best standard.

Yeah.

And it shows you how well the UAE team are prepared and.

Yeah. And who knows? Roglic and Thomas really gun time trialers, maybe they're still so affected like they did so well compared to the fact that Thomas had a dislocated shoulder two days ago and Roglich had the most horrific crash and he's. He's a mummy underneath his time trial kit. It would have been so uncomfortable for him to ride that time trial. He's got elbow padding, all his elbows in that time trial position. His whole butt is just tape. So the fact that they're only 44 seconds behind, maybe if they were fresh, they would have been equal to Poguchar.

Yeah. We're never going to know how injury has an effect on your body and I know that the body is working to repair infection, so it's working overtime. It's now asked to compete at the highest level whilst it's when every second matters. Yeah. So it has to have an effect.

Yeah. Touching on every second mattering. I really like this from Poguchar and this is a win for me, in my eyes, is that at the start he rolled off early. The guy's holding him and holding his back seat. And then the counter is in front of him with a 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. And at 2 to 1, Pogajic starts going. He gets down to the bottom of the. Not many people notice it, but he gets down to the bottom of the ramp. There's still one second on the clock at the time and the two timekeepers have got their hands up, looking at each other and they just kind of brush it off. And I think he either deserves to lose a second or you said, does he get a disqualification for that, for going early, but you don't see anyone ever do that. But he was so determined for the race and I really just liked the attitude of get me out there. I want to ride as hard as I can. And he just goes. And that was a really good start, I think, for Pocket.

Well, I don't know if you noticed either. Van Aert, the guy was holding him and his wheel spun. The guy didn't let him go. He went early as well and his wheel spun on the start ramp. That's how keen he was to go. Yeah, so it was, it was, it was a fantastic time trial. And look, time trialing is a unique thing to watch. It is very kind of slow and evolves as the, you know, not like a, a road race but, but it's still got excitement and seeing, oh, Richie Port rode so well on the time trial again and you know, another top 10 finish and there were some outstanding results except Pugachar was just far too good and, and you know, that's the next question. Can anybody beat him?

And as always, the race is far from over. But let's finish off with some predictions. I mean, Pogachar is in an unbelievable position. His two biggest rivals, not they've crashed, they're about two minutes behind. 144, 150, something like that. It's hard to see him losing, but we know that anything can happen. And given the first five days of this Tour de France, literally anything can happen. Most of the GC contenders are all actually grouped together at that 130 to 215 mark. Let's just pocketize way ahead of them. So what does that mean?

There's a lot I want to say on this. I just love Roglich's attitude. He, he to me is he epitomizes what the cycling, what got, what competition, what, what having a go is. He never complains. He's, you know, he's not, you know, never woe is me. And, and you know, it would be devastating to lose last year's Tour like that. And you know, he's carried on and won races since then and it's not the end of the world, he said. And you know, I'm not defined by what I win or lose. It's how I go about the journey. And I love his attitude and I think it was in one of the races where he crashed and, and chased down the whole peloton, the Dauphine or somewhere. I can't remember what's might have been the, the welter. But anyway, the way he goes about his cycling, I really want him to win, but I can't see how Pogachar can lose unless something bad happens to him because he doesn't have to prove himself now. He's got such a good lead that he just has to defend. And we know that if you get cocky and attack in yellow, you had making a big risk and that could be the way to win it as well and put more time into Your opponents. There's so many scenarios that can pan out here, but it's up to the other riders, the other teams to attack him. And if they try, if any of us try and ride tempo, that's absolutely into Poguchar's hands. Yeah, he'll just sit on and defend. Yeah, they need to throw riders up the road. So he. And he. I don't think he's got the depth in his team. And this is the test that the other teams have to do. Test his team and see whether a good team is really instrumental in allowing a GCE rider to win. And this is what I would be doing if I was the DS of ineos, if I was the DS of Jumbo Visma, in any, you know, any opportunity you see, throw people up the road. So he has to make a decision. He can't cover every move, so that's the only way they're going to beat him. They can't just ride tempo up every climb. That's music to his ears.

Yeah, you'd almost think that. Yeah, Ineos and Yamba Visma and even the Astana riders have to. And I assume the movie star riders will be up there. People like Katana. Yeah, just attack him from all angles and gang up on him.

Gang up on him. And it sounds really harsh, but this will be a true test because he's. He's basically in the lead now, even though he's not in yellow.

Yeah, I don't want this to happen, but I have a feeling that he's going to run away from them all. And I just feel like the crashes might have too much of an impact. You don't see riders crash badly and just get back to their form that often. And yeah, he's fresh, he's in great form. He hasn't crashed.

It could be like the Ejiro all over again, couldn't it?

Yeah, well, it could be like those Tours years ago where Froome was just too strong and he just kept.

Right.

He was in yellow and he kept running away from everyone. But we'll see how it plays out. Because like you said, the exciting part is that we're not going to see INEOS use their traditional power move of just put seven guys in the front and ride the peloton out of their legs. And it'd be quite a boring race because if they do that pocket, I'll just hang on. And he's strong enough to hang on, so they can't do that tactic. They're going to have to Change it up.

Well, let's look at it in here. So you've got Carapaz, Port and Thomas.

Yeah.

And you know, you're looking at it. It looks like Port is the best rider yet. He's the furthest back.

Yeah.

So I would be throwing him up the road and because he's three or three and a half minutes behind Poga Chair and he'll poker chow will have a, he'll have a dispute in his own mind, should I be chasing Richie. And then he could get lucky and get a two minute break and you know, that's, that's the exciting part of what could happen. I'm not sure whether Thomas is in the form that he thought he was. The crashes obviously disguised good or bad. Carapaz time trial was pretty average, but he's still a good climber.

Yeah.

So they have, they have three opportunities.

They've got weapons there.

Yeah. So I'm not sure whether, you know, Sep Kuss can, can do the same and throw himself up the road and because he did time trial. Well, if you're time trialing well, you will climb well. There's no just disputing that in my mind.

Yeah. And he's, he's so far back in GC that of course that there's no relevancy for him. So he's just, he's there as a pure climber to help.

And then bike exchange will throw Chavez up the road or throw Yates up the road, who's 10 minutes behind. Chavez is over three minutes behind. So being like this, it's harder for Pogajar to, you know, he can't keep.

Yeah. Can't defend from everyone.

No. No. So it's, it's almost better sometimes if all the GC riders are together it makes it easier for the yellow jersey to defend. But when there's such big gaps, he's got to make decisions on is that person worth chasing or is going to just be a bluff?

Yeah, it's him versus everyone else.

Yeah.

So yeah, it'll be interesting to see. Well, we can't wait to keep talking about it. Yeah, we've got plenty to talk about, I'm sure over the next few stages. Tonight is a flat stage and then they do the longest stage of the Tour, which is 250 or 260km of. There's some hills in there as well. Nothing crazy high in the categories, but definitely some hills. Really one day classic type of stage. And then the weekend is the mountains. So I think our next episode will probably be Monday morning. After the two mountain stages, but we'll see what happens.

Don't underestimate these look like benign stages that don't have much fear. They're the days where guys can get away in a peloton of 25 or 30 and put UAE under so much pressure.

As we've said, anything can happen. Yep.

And I can't wait.

Yeah. Well, that's it for this episode. Thank you very much for listening and we'll either see you on the next Tour de France episode special edition of the podcast, or see you on Tuesday for our normal weekly Get Fast podcast episodes. Thanks for listening.