CRAZY 20% SLOPES: GC SHOWDOWN RECAP | VUELTA STAGE 4

1.First GC Shakeup on 20% Slopes

Welcome to laa stage four today we had our first real GC shakeup we hit some insane gradients today north of 20% in one of the toughest finishing climbs definitely I can remember this season so excited to get in and P unpack that whole race plus a valuable lesson to kids not to celebrate too early before we dive in today's podcast it's brought to you by laal I wore probably every cycling brand out there from castelli to Asos to spin 11 for the last 10 years and I always find myself bouncing between cycling Brands and that was until I started wearing lall I love their shames I love their jerseys I love their Innovation it's founded by former GB cyclist yanto Barker I had him on the podcast and you can tell this is a brand that's founded by a cyclist because it's so functional for our needs so whether you're looking to win your local cat One race or you're just doing a sport you're going to find this kit is exactly what you've been looking for what really sets Lal apart for me it's the feedback they've taken from their Pro Lev teams like sponsoring Bora for the past few seasons and bringing that into the kits that they're now making for the everyday public if you haven't checked it out yet I highly encourage you to do it you can get 20% off your order thanks to lall who've given us this amazing gift for you if you head on over to la. CC and you use code roadman 20 a checkout it's going to knock 20% % off your order which is a decent chunk of cash and you can pop that code feel free to share it in your Club WhatsApp group or whatever cuz it's kiss that you're really going to be happy you recommend it to a friend Sarah let's get into today's wela stage four yeah so we're away kind of from the flat stages for a day and we'll get into that in a few minutes but a couple of pieces of news from overnight you love the bit of overnight gosip I I do but you know what what I've really noticed is there's so so little coverage in comparison to the tour to France the tour to France when we were doing the live podcast the news from overnight segment that I loved find out the little piece of Gossip there was so much for it we you had to pick and choose your top one or two favorite pieces but there's just not as many uh journalists it's kind of why I like the Welter in a way because it's the cycling fans race so much the a lot of the the blow fans are gone and it's actually back to being real bike fans yeah I agree so going back to that story from yesterday where Julian alip has it's official that he is going to Tudor next year so he leaves sidal quickstep and Patrick lafaver was interviewed today about it this morning and basically said it hurts to see him leave we have a very long history together the little guy came to us very young we had a lot of work but we also had a lot of fun together it still hurts to see him leave he was not just a rider Julian is like a child of the family that you're giving up they are really really nice words from H Patrick leaver not getting himself into hot water for once he's meant to be a lovely guy yes I know D on the podcast and he said he's one of the nicest guys he's ever met in cand and yeah definitely portrayed very differently in the mainstream social media yeah I agree and then one other Story and Another transfer story this came as a bit of a surprise so Kaden Groves basically confirmed a lot of long-term rumors that he was going to leave alend kunic at the end of this season he was going to be riding a new colors for 2025 so that was all there was no he hadn't he hadn't kind of said who the team was um until today he basically said I can't wait to continue my J Journey at Alpa cunic for the next two years I feel at home and perform at my highest level in this shirt so he basically did a full 180 because two days ago he said it feels really good to ride for this team but I've already signed a contract for next year so I have a new team and it'll be announced soon so pretty fickle Bunch you that like I have to like strengthen his negotiation position that he pretends he signed I would guess ja ala yeah everyone just thinks the Aussies are going back there all the time but yeah who knows interesting okay let's get into the happenings of today today's stage was from Palencia to Pico voras it was 167 kilm the stage had a couple of early kickers in with a cat 2 climb and the cat one Alto depel in the opening 54 km there was bonus seconds on offer Den the following climb which was a cat tree climb but honestly not much of note happened early in the stage it didn't really kick off till we hit that finishing slope on the peak over laast and it was 14.6 km at 6.2% but as we said yesterday that was a little bit of a fake news statistic because the toughest part of the climb we had that from 5K to go to 2K to go a 3 km section where the gradient didn't dip below 15% and it had a 600 meter patch that was over 20% mentioned yesterday Roman B won there back in 2021 Jay V won last time they raised up the far side of the climb and he could be seeing setting a bit of tempo into the bottom of the climb today but yeah the first real Shakedown in GC was I was excited to watch it I didn't fall asleep on the couch today no you didn't you were alert for the entire thing what I really noticed was that Bora they started riding and taking control of the race so early I was kind of a little bit wondering why would they do that well like this isn't the queen stage this isn't the biggest climbing test in this year's welta but it was an important stage and it gives us a lot of insight into who has legs and who hasn't got legs some people wrote the Jiro some people rote the Tour of France some people are like they look good on paper and we'll get into the big losers guys like Adam Yates today people that look great on paper had a great tour to France and everything would point to they're going to have great weth at espania but then you get to the finishing climb today and all is revealed so we kind of got an insight into who's genuinely a GC Contender who's here in their top condition and who's going to be stage hunted or just a passenger is on a three-week holiday in France and I think I'm sort of circling around your question a little bit but why borrow or Ryden so early it was intention they obviously knew what we all know now that Primus rugit has arrived a very good version of Primus rugit he literally rode that climb bottom to top today yeah like he took the climb up I think Jay V started setting a bit of pace COV launched over the top in sort of almost like a counter move RIT took up Ryden then and he almost didn't leave the front it was super impressive it was great to see him was it back out front doing what he does best what I really noticed as well today is we're going to talk about the gradients they were extreme but you could almost feel the heat radiating out from the Telly we were watching it I mean it was up to 40° at some stages today it it almost feels like some people are better at dealing with the heat than others do you think that that's true I mean it must be very hard to if you're not good at dealing with the heat you go into that red it's very takes a very very long time to cool yourself down again so yeah look there's a couple of factors to it some are physiological some are mental or genetic like some of people are just genetically better predisposed at regulating cold and warm temperatures some people are just tough like there's just tough guys in bike racing and that's a factor as well but physiologically there's a few things going on like sweat rate and efficiency is super important some athletes have a higher sweat rate that means they can dissipate heat more effectively so that's going to mean that they're more efficient at sweating meaning they lose less salt and electrolytes helping them to maintain hydration and performance cardiovascular efficiency is another one as well some athletes are coming into the race like Primos RIT just in super good condition that means they can get better blood flow to their skin that's going to Aid in heat dissipation without significantly compromising the blood flow to your muscles and acclamation we've seen you know Remco is quite famous for his heat acclamation I'm working with core sensor now we had the founder on the podcast and core temperatures are used pretty much core body temperatures used pretty much a common place across the pro pelaton now people are doing heat acclamation sessions you even get a Heat acclamation score if you use the app I done it a little bit in advanced in bike packing because we some days up you know the Garment was registering 46 some days in Albania it definitely helped me anecdotally because it helps increase blood plasma volume improving sweat response and that's all going to help with better temperature regulation so there's a few different parts to it but yeah some people are definitely better set up than others to cope with that we did see with Josh tling today he was kind of spot out the back when the climbing got really serious today and the amount of salt that was caked on his black short it was really really obvious wasn't it that he I mean his shorts were just caked in white yeah 100% it's actually a good Junction for cuz we have a sponsor which we weren't going to announce for a few weeks but it's a cool like Segway to talk about it so the sponsor is actually going to be elements this isn't even a sponsor read this is just giving you a heads up on because there is a free gift if you go over to the URL it's drink element.com Romany element is essentially Sals and I've been super super aggressive in trying to get element on as a sponsor for the podcast because all the data points to how effective how poorly our body operates in the absence of sodium and when I've had amazing conversations with like physiologists Alan liame Dan laang and they're all so obsessed with losing salts but for so many of us we seem to couple taking on salts with taking on sugar they're two different problems you might need have a sugar need but you definitely have a salt need so having a tablet or a drink that you're able to just take back on sodium without replenishing you know sugar and all these other nasty stuff that you might even need has been a game changer so I'm going to pop that in the link below but you'll hear more about us in a few weeks when we officially announce LM as one of our sponsors for September I think okay so there was a lot of hype about this finishing climb tell us about how it all played out you know what when we were when they were coming up to the climb and we're kind of getting into the sticky Parts I was like this is all going to be over in about 2 minutes I'm not going to go and make myself a cup of te hour at the crunch point but it did take slow boys race it took quite a while to get you know what it's that steep that it's almost anti-climatic because like they're not going very fast it's like I'm attacking and they're inci and clear like which is a bit weird to see it looked so hard I mean it looked like me going up a climb shoulders rocking hips rocking low Cadence pain face yeah it was tough like I think we touched on Red Bull really committed to riding the hard Tempo into the base of the climb and interestingly when you listen to Rog after he didn't even know the team were going to ride the hard Tempo then he felt a pressure to deliver As Leaders often do that shows massive confidence in RIT into the base of the climb but it's also not a guarantee just because you say we have the strong guy doesn't make it true you still need to back that up and have the strongest guy something to note as well that I would have hated that climb it was just the gradients were horrible but the surface just looks so hard to get a rhythm on which meant that position was so important because if you CAU behind someone who's like zigzagging or they're clipping out or something it's just very hard to move around people yeah so they went up what looks like a quite a nice tarmac roll and then they rode and then they took a really extreme hard left onto this it was concrete it wasn't Tac and it came with all of the bumps that their traction points their traction points because it's so steep yeah yeah but it just it didn't H didn't look Pleasant whatsoever no and even CS everywhere on the hydration thing as well like the counterintuitive part of this is the climb you're going so slow so even that last 5K like as you said you thought you'd have time to make a cup of tea but it goes on forever you don't want to be carrying balls on that as well so it's 40° it's going on for a long time 20 plus minutes but you don't want to carry a bottle on it so it's people are going to feel it tomorrow I think the first as we said Jay Vine hid it into the base of climb for UAE they're just the roster stacked on UAE then we have COV came over the top and that was the first time rugit out his hand and I was looking at it kind of going RL is riding almost like a domestique for someone else he's just sitting on the front and Ching out this Tempo like someone boiling a lobster he was just slowly turning the heat open I was like he's actually not doing that much damage which is still a group of 12 or 15 and then Felix gal from ag2r who's a co-leader there benl Conor is the main leader of ag2r who lost I think a minute 11 today Felix gal comes over the top rugit doesn't panic and he just starts reeling back in and that up in Tempo from rogl lost more people and then we only really had at the front of the bike race rogich Mass Felix gal who would be soon dropped after that and Van anfel the young lad from lotto and as soon soon as they get off the steep slopes Mass who I thought was in trouble rode through straight away M and then Landa got across and then we seen almea H rello and gal rejoined from behind and that was kind of the the front eight was a strong group but rogl just looked to be cruising compared to the rest of the lads it was so amazing to see Landa coming back across as well we're like lisimo he just never dies he's like the honey pader and you see when there was a little bit of an up and and Pace near the end land got dropped but as soon as he was coming back and I was saying to Sarah she's like she's like who do you think has this stage I was like ret has the Sprint unless land doesn't get the cut in the flyer he's about to take and he came up as soon as he caught them he just carried that momentum straight past the group yeah and it was Van enfeld that closed him down and maybe without him closing them down rogl doesn't win that stage and then in the end it was just an absolute shitfest from Van anfel like the I don't know why they put the finish line on a corner but they decided to to Finish Line in the corner rogl had to come the wrong way around Van enfeld thought he had to win went to stick his hand up because he stuck his hand up couldn't do a bike throw seeing rugit coming with one hand on the bar tries to do a one-handed bike throw rugit dips him then he uses the one hand to just smash the bars in disappointment what a rookie ER I mean even I don't think that I would do that he andit as were online they were saying RIT doesn't even celebrate against RIT finish nailed on you just wait until you have the win and oh my God the look on his face what actually happened as well is that he half put his hand up then he out of the corner of his eye I think he saw rit's wheel put his hands back down his hand I tried to tried to show it like a war on bike show it was all too late at that point but like Sprint to the Finish Line Sprint past the Finish Line what you think is the Finish Line when you're sprinting is actually like you need to Sprint a meter past line if you through the line you end up like subconsciously up like a couple yeah every every cration does his celebration trademark is turning off his white computer PR lap that's it for him ah I fail for the kid because it would have been the biggest win of his entire career no I didn't feel for him I I thought it was absolutely hilarious and I just thought fany though yeah but he's never going to do that again I'm sorry but these are the lessons just for I actually don't know that guy uh van a like what's his story he's a lot of Destiny Rider yeah a lot of Destiny Rider he's i g to say 22 or 23 he's a young kid hasn't had a lot of big results he's been knocking on the door he's 11th in Strat up Yankee this year so just outside the top 10 he won the UAE tour this year which was a big result big Riders there and it was a unexpected result for him at the time put out some jabel is the main climb in the UAE tour and it's about 11 km at 6.7% and I seen his projected wats per kilog or 6.28 watts per kilogram for that 27 minute climb so he can definitely hold himself in the best company in the world but he hasn't really done it consistently and as I said this would have been a huge huge biggest win of his career but at the beginning of uh the interviews a couple of days ago he was talking about going for a classification so it's you know he's very very yeah very ambitious which we absolutely love to see so what did you learn from today we did there was as you said a lot of exposure a lot of learning today I's just looking at Van enfeld on GC he's only had 41 seconds and fifth overall on GC now so he is right up there uh what did I learn on GC that a 95% fifth Prim much Rit is better than every other bike rider in the world well every other bike R you know as like yanis and pogy aren't at the FTA but I'm glad they're not here it just feels so much more exciting that we glad they're not here now but if rogl has a 4minute lead after seven stages you know we'll soon run out of things to talk about like so cuz a lot of other people like the favorites Before the Race for GC you're looking at sep Co almea who actually put up a decent sh today RIT Yates you're starting to rule out some of them already C looked very second hand he did Almeida yet looked decent but he's coming off the back of a tough Tour of France where he got fought Yates looked like I feel like yat should be able to stick in that company at the front end of the bike race there we did see yat today going back to the team care for bottles and food so it kind of does give you a little bit of an indication that perhaps this co-leader stuff isn't really n i don't I think it's just whatever you sitting at the back of the bunch or whatever like I wouldn't read too much into that it's not like these guys aren't Hollywood stars like if Dr the back at a bunch and the cars close they'll just get the food themselves it's less energy okay than you know like most the feing they try to do actually at the moment just off the side the road you're saying but yeah I wouldn't read into that that he's in any sort of support Ro just because you seeing him with a bottle like or yeah I can see where you went with it okay so who were the massive losers today for me it for me it was seos seos did we get a time check on seos uh I think he's where is seos on the stage on the stage he is 28 seconds down wasn't disastrous for him on the stage worse for some other people I think benl Conor bit of a disaster not a huge fan of Ben o Conor he always seems to be winging something but he was a minute and 11 seconds back caraz and Adam Yates I think for me were two of I call both them yesterday as potentially there in the shakeup B at 129 George Bennett came in that seus group with pav Civ excuse me pav COV 28 seconds down so yeah look there's a lot of losers I think that group of a which contains rogl uh van enfeld I made ER Mass which was brilliant to see he looked so good Felix g h Riello Mikel Landa they look to be the best climbers in the bike race at the moment okay amazing right let's go through the results I won't go through the stage because you ENT she just read out the stage there we'll quickly go through the GC so bras RIT uh eight seconds behind him is J Almeida 32 seconds behind is enri mass 38 seconds behind is Antonio tiir he actually had a great ride that kind of snuck in under the radar today he finished just behind that group of nine or of eight on his own and he looked to be finishing super strong that was sneaky little right F yeah he really really fought and then we have in fifth a honorable mention to Leonard vanv who got pipped on the line by rockage today uh the points Jersey go through the first couple we've got white vaner in the green jersey Kaden Groves and then Lou Angel mate in third and that competition's really heating up because today we' seen Kaden Groves again pipping W in the final intermediate Sprint and also a little bit of a coming together in them as well where it was almost like w yeah like I'll mix it up physically as well as I'll mix it up my legs if need be like w seems a little windy to me like if you've watched any of the documentaries the Netflix behind the scenes he complains a lot about the physical contact and I wondered is that Kaden Groves getting into his head a little bit saying I'll be physical in this battle oh wow that's interesting perhaps okay A bit of reaction after so we had I wanted to hear from SE cuz I was disappointed with him he said the ride was super tough the heat met it hard and the entry to the climb was a big group so it made it very nervous I didn't have the best feeling but I only lost about 30 seconds so I can be happy enough with that then he was asked about RIT and he said everyone knew he was going to be the favorite and was going to be really strong especially because it's lavala he looked pretty strong to me sep was smiling the whole way through I think he was putting on a little bit of a brave face there you know with the result today yeah it's hard to tell he lost a little bit of time see none of it's massively significant on its own but he keeps just losing a little bit of time here a little bit of time there the Welter is just started it's only stage four so I don't think we should read too much into it but he's already like on GC like he's back can you find him on GC he is back at 114 already in 13th Place don't really want to be given rogl a minute 14 Head Start absolutely not going back to Van AEL uh who as I got pipped on the line he said I can be very happy with the condition and how the race went if I had been beaten in a different way it would have been a very good result but right now it hurts a bit maybe I will think differently about it in a few days he's definitely going to have a couple of learnings from that I'm sure Victor camper will be having have him on his Vlog maybe over the next couple of weeks we'll hear the full story and then finally to wrap it up ra glitch so he was asked how it feels to be back to winning form and Rish it was amazing what I've really noticed as well going back to the Heat and I know we're kind of dwelling on this bit is that in lavta they're interviewing the winners on the cool down bikes so they don't bring them into like a Press Room sit them on a stool they're absolutely roasting yeah I don't know what that's about yeah they they're put they're allowed to be interviewed or they're allowing them onto the cool down bike with the cool down vest in Spain yeah I thought that was I think it's really good maybe it's just because of this focus on getting the athletes really cold and cool down as soon as possible so when he was asked how he feels be back winning he said it's life it doesn't just always go up and when I asked by today he said I wasn't sure how it would go because of my back but still there was no other option than to go Full Throttle it was a tough climb very steep I'm recovering from an injury and after a few hours I felt my back acting up but hopefully it won't get work worse the goal Remains the Same we'll take it day by day he said you never know what your last victory will be so I have to enjoy it tomorrow we're on to stage five we're rolling from fenta Del mastra to Seville it's 170 km forecast is warm again over 40° it's a pretty flat stage an intermediate Sprint at 24.6 kilm to go there is time bonuses on that but it's going to be contested by the break Caden Groves and W against it GC guys aren't going to be going for that time bonus very hard to see past W Caden Groves and maybe strong to round out a Podium tomorrow H it's going to be kind of a replication of stage two and stage three I think with that sprinting but yeah nice to finally get into the hills and have something to talk about yeah absolutely Ro man thanks for tuning in we're going to be back again tomorrow to unpack a Sprint stage in the meantime click up here there's another video I know you're going to love and down here so you don't miss the notification for tomorrow's