He's 13, you know, he wants to do all these intervals. He wants to get a watt meter. I say, "No, no, no. We're just going to ride fun. We're going to go hard and you learn how to ride your bike." So, it's just a fun thing for us right now. But it's amazing because some things can't be taught in the abstract as well. Like you can tell somebody like if it's a fourman breakaway. You can tell somebody like how to get back onto the wheel after doing your turn. But like in the abstract sitting down at a coffee shop teaching somebody how to do that, it doesn't make much sense until your heart rate's 190. Exactly. And and as you know, okay, we're always talking about power to weight ratio. We're always talking about, you know, how fast people can go up climbs. But the one of the most important things in cycling is how can you handle your bike inside the pelaton when people are crashing around you when you're finding little holes. And I just love being able to experience that with them because he does have some great awareness in the in the Pelaton. And that's something that is almost impossible to teach. That's just an inherent skill and he he's he definitely has that. Well, we have an Irish rider over here. I'm not sure if you remember racing against some Kieran Power. He raced for Navigators and stuff back in the day. Definitely. But Kieran's back racing much like uh you because his son is racing. His son I think is national champion under 16 and Kieran's in the bunch racing with him. And I often how how cool is that to be able to race with your dad and have them say to you like go here, don't go there, you know, open your sprint here, don't open your sprint there. Yeah, it's super fun. We do the Tuesday night uh we call them the Tuesday night world championships where you know all the best all the best riders and we've won he's won the last two weekends in a I'm like I'm laughing because we're we're probably about to be banned from the T Tuesday night worlds because I'm getting in the breakway with them and I'm towing them around. Um so it's kind of funny. George, let me rewind right the way to the start growing up in Queens. I remember growing up in Dublin when I started cycling. I was just it wasn't cool because I missed the Shan Kelly Steven Roach era and so cycling had taken a dip after that. There were some Irish riders and no disrespect to them but they weren't lighting up the world stage. you know, your Paul Kim images and Martin Earies. So, we hadn't got really this mainstream cycling appeal. So, when I started cycling, I remember putting soccer shorts on over my cycling shorts heading out because I was so embarrassed. Then I get out into the countryside and I take them off and I put in my back jersey pocket. But it must have been strange growing up in New York trying to cycle. Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know, it's been fun to uh witness the renaissance of cycling here in the US and I'm sure similar there in uh where you're at in Ireland. Um but it went from like you said, it was definitely not a cool thing. There was not a a sport in school like I was pretty much the only cyclist in my high school. Although I got a lot of support from my friends because at that point I was racing internationally and I started getting a bit more attention. So for them they started thinking it was cool. But it's not like you'd walk into a coffee shop or, you know, you know, a grocery store just to get a snack in your bike hit. Like you would never do that unless you Now, now you can go into a coffee shop and sit there and have a full meal and no one looks at you funny. Exactly. It's and and where it depends on where you are, but it becomes a fashion statement as well. You see people like perfectly kitted up, you know, they're matching their bikes, everything's perfect, you know, it's it's become sort of a a style fashion thing as well. So, um, it's changed a lot, that's for sure. George, when did you make the move out to Jirona? I moved out to Jirona. So, I lived in Ko, Italy my first three years of my career. So, 94, 95, 96, and then 97 I moved out to Jirona. And what was Jirona like back then?
And in in those seven years where you guys were just so dominant on it, how much of a role did you have in writer selection? So you were clearly the voice on the road for, you know, controlling this dominance that you had over seven years. But how much of you saying to Johan, you know, these are the guys I need around me to do my job in those key stages around massive central and stuff. Obviously Lance had his, you know, climbing lieutenants who, you know, he needed later on, but did you have a role in that selection for the guys you needed around you? Nope. Zero. I knew that, uh, you know, Johan was a great um, you know, selector of of guys. Um, and it was always from from the beginning of the year, you never were guaranteed a spot, even though I probably was, but like they would never let me know that. Um, but we knew that we'd have three or four guys like myself that were going to be, you know, our job was to to keep Lance out of trouble, keep him safe, you know, the position guys, keep him up in the front, and then the workh horses once we needed to chase down some breakaways or control some time gaps from the breakaways, that was going to be us. And, um, you know, that was more definitely a Johan and Lance thing. I feel like the the sport has changed so much that, yeah, of course, we trained really hard back in the day. Um, but these guys are never home. I mean, they go from race to altitude camp to race. I think one of the top guys, I won't mention his name, but from the tour of Romani to the tour to France, he was going to be he's going to be home four or five days. That's it. It's brutal. It's Yeah, it's brutal. You're either at an altitude camp or you're racing. And I mean, that's hard. You know, I loved uh my role as a cyclist and I I never took it for granted being a professional cyclist. I always worked as hard as I could, but I feel like I had a little bit of balance where I can come home a bit more than uh normal guys. And I was able to come back to the US and spend time at home, you know, before the tour to France. And I feel like that made my career um a bit more manageable. I don't know if I can handle it now where these guys are gone all the time. But like that's testament to what did you 17 to Francis like you need the balance to last that long and that would be my worry. Like I was on guest on Cyclist magazine podcast last month and they were talking to me about Sagan and they were saying basically Sagan you know the flop has won the world's three times and I was like if you look at Sagan through a lens of purely pro cycling you go yeah he's gone off the pile but how much of that is deliberate how much of it's him saying you know what there's other things in my life and I don't want to be like you're saying five days at home in a four month period I I'm happy to pick up a big paycheck I'm happy with the level I'm at. I have some cool legacy already, but there's more to life, you know? I don't know what he's into. Spirituality, personal relationships, other side hustles he has. Yeah. No, that's a great that's a great point. I don't know him personally, but he definitely was part of, you know, my generation as I was ending my career where there was a lot more balance involved. You were able to come home a bit more than a lot more than now. So yeah, perhaps we're seeing that where, you know, he may not want want nothing to do with all these altitude camps and really just not having a life, so to speak. Rubé, we can't talk to Mr. Hen Copy without talking about Rube. It looks [ __ ] stressful on TV to watch. My blood pressure is up watching this race on TV. Like the speed you're hitting sections like Aronberg Forest and like the crash that Mitch Docker had a few years and stuff on it. It's stressful to watch. How stressful is it to go into that like year after year after year? What you have like 17 attempts at it? Yeah. Yeah. Every single time you're going in thinking at at a point you were thinking to yourself, top 10's not even a result here.
You know, you see Rory Mroy driving the ball 350 down the center of the fairway. You don't see the days he was in the driving range shanking drives until his hands bled and going home crying and wondering what he's going to do with his life. I feel like that way as well when I look at the move, I look at the Hing Cappy brand, the hotel, and I'm like, "Shit, George has this so well figured out." And I'm trying to build my brand, which is, you know, many multiple smaller than you. And I'm kind of trying to find that trail that you've plotted through business. And it's motivating to know that as I'm stumbling, you've also stumbled on that path as well. And I'm sure there's people looking at my podcast and going, "Holy [ __ ] he's so big." And they're on episode four thinking, "Oh, I need to quit." But it's great to know somebody else is having the same very human struggles. Absolutely. I mean, it's, you know, it's constant and and I embrace it. I feel like I know that, you know, it's not things aren't going to always be perfect. Um, I embrace the challenges even though sometimes they're really tough. Sometimes you think you're not going to get through. But, you know, what's what what what's the best thing to do when you really feel like you're down in the dumps and you're not going to get through? Go for a bike ride. We always got the bike, right? where you can clear your mind, get out to do that. I still love doing that. I still have my health. I still really, you know, uh, pay a lot of attention to my health. Even probably more I'm probably much more balanced athlete now than when I was a professional cyclist. As you know, you can't do anything when you're a professional cyclist. Going for a 20-minute walk, you get sore. So, I I love the fact that I'm able to still stay healthy, work out all the time. And, you know, that's a big uh outlet for me as well. George, I know I a big focus shift for me and just to finish up on this one, a big focus shift for me was I was trying to coach basically young kids to be, you know, the next George Hingapy to see if I could get a 17-year-old, put him on a team in France and progress. And I had a moment where a buddy of mine asked me to coach him and I was like, "No way." He was like a 45year-old alcoholic and basically every bad habit you can have from smoking to drugs and I was like, "No, it's not happening." And then he eventually convinced me to coach him. And I seen over the next six months, like the huge weight loss, huge power improvements, but it was the stuff you couldn't measure, like the relationship improvement with his wife, the his happiness levels, his energy levels, just how motivated and stuff he felt. And that's really my calling now is to spread the cycling message far and wide. But you have spread this cycling message further and wider than basically anyone I know out there. And I'm not sure I'm sure I'm not sure if you realize the impact you've had on the generations behind you. Like I wouldn't be doing what I do if it wasn't for you and Lance. And I'm sure many of the listeners of the podcast wouldn't be tuning into this podcast if it wasn't for the path that you and Lance bet through those forests of Europe to bring cycling to mainstream consciousness. So I suppose from me and the listeners, thanks for what you do. I appreciate it. That's uh really nice of you to say that. And and uh like I said, I I love my position that I've had in the sport. Uh I still love riding my bike on a daily basis. And you know, those things that that story you just mentioned about that 45-year-old, I feel like those are some of the most impactful things we can do now is yeah, we can help, you know, the aspiring professional athlete, but when you see cycling change an average person's life, which we all know that it can, those are the most impactful stories for me.