Robeman, today I want to talk about cutting edge UCI reforms
Robeman, today I want to talk about cutting edge UCI reforms. Let's cure that intro! The big question is this. How do we use cycling as a tool to improve our health, our happiness and our longevity? That is the question on this podcast will give you the answers. My name is Anthony Welch and welcome to the Robeman Podcast. Roadman, welcome back to another Roadman Cycling Podcast. It's Tuesday. Thank you for joining me. Today I want to talk about these cutting edge UCI reforms which take effect from, you've guessed it, April Fools Day, the 1st of April. Before I jump in and talk to you about how the UCI is just bringing in some much needed hard-hitting reforms, hope you can sense the sarcasm in my voice here. Before I jump in and go through these first-ical UCLA reforms, let me just remind you about Patreon because patreon's how we form the podcast. Every day I beat this drum but it's not to beat the drum for the sake of it. It's not a dispassionate advertisement reading for a brand. I mention Patreon every single day because it matters. It's the lifeblood of the podcast and it keeps us moving forward. So please consider visiting www.patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch you can buy the price of a beer once a month just say thanks for the podcast that is if you're getting some value out of podcast I'm gonna get that patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch I think I should get that tattooed maybe across my forehead there's an idea there is an idea okay so somebody issues we have in the sport at the moment we've some crazy fast technical descent and we've seen Bad crashes like Remko, Evan Paul, gone over the side of a bridge last year. Can we fix some of that stuff? Maybe netting. We've seen really poorly ill-advised descents near the finishing races, thinking of very bad crashes we had in the Rio Olympics. We've had the race finish just last week where Sam Bennett spoke out about the race finishing E3, Saxo, and the technical, you know, they called him Belgium, sleeping policemen, road furniture, Ballards, ramps all the way into the finish. Can we do something about that? We had Taylor Wiles on the podcast talking about pay inequality from men to women, pay party not just from prize money but team salaries. Can we bring in maybe some UCO reform around that? We had a downhill finish in Torap, which was just downright unacceptable for Fabio Jakobsson nearly died last year. Can we bring in some reform around that? No, the wise old men at the UCI sat around their big table and they decided to ban the super talk and riding with your forearms on the bars. Neither of which have ever caused a crash in a boy craze. This is some of the dumbest shit I've ever seen.
Let's go into them individually
Let's go into them individually. The super talk. For anyone who's not familiar, you might have to google what Super Took is and you'll see it. So it's effectively holding onto the center of your bars and sitting your crutch down onto the top tube, almost tucked in underneath the saddle. You're descending like that. I don't see the problem. Where's the problem? No one ever crashes down this. Riders get to the soil. Descending is dangerous. Descending is fast. It's like watching Formula One. These are the best boy-growters in the world. They get to decide where the limit is on every single descent. They get to decide where the grip is. They get to decide if they want to push that limit. They get to choose when to break. Let's break later. They get to take aggressive lions. They get to travel at incredibly high speeds. These are all very measured risks from the best boy-growters on the planet. The exact same way that the soybeans get down into a super-took position is a measured risk from a professional boycrotor. It's not a more dangerous or less dangerous risk than any of the other ones we talked about, like carrying high speed, aggressive lines, late braking. They get to decide where that limit is and to say you can't put your body into some position which isn't inherently dangerous is just such a bizarre regulation from the UCI. And it's stupid decisions like this that causes to just bring into question credibility of the entire UCI. Like why have they overlooked so many of the important issues in our sport and prioritized and gone quite an aggressive marketing campaign. Stupid new rules like this. The second one is having your arms on the... so it's using your forearm on the handlebars to effectively put yourself into an arrow TT position. This is also banned. While I'm not a fan of You know, a roid are roiding on the front of the bunch down this. If they hit a pothole, they can go down. The real problem there's the pothole, not the roid are in that position. Well, that's a debate for another day. But this is just negated by people have respect for those around them. They're professionals and there's a mutual respect within the Peloton. People agree not to do this. The same way people decide not to roid in a crosswind, in the middle of the bunch, with their hands off the bars to change your raincoat, they'll move to the soil. It's a respecting, you know, it's a higher risk moment in the boy grace for a data site to take your hands off the bar to put a raincoat on. Like what's next? You can't take your hands off the bar to put a raincoat on because it's dangerous. It's just bizarre, but it's, you know, it's the latest in a long list of the UCO.
It's just been totally clueless to the actual demands and problems…
It's just been totally clueless to the actual demands and problems within our sport. Like, that descent where Remko Evanport crashed last year, he could have died. We see these all the time in the Tour de France this year. I'm not even saying we need to tackle these, but let's acknowledge them. We've seen that in the Olympics, like it was an Anne-Mique van Blouten, an absolutely horrific crash in the Olympics. We've seen time after time, danger sprint finishes, but none of this seems to matter. All that matters is dumb shit that matters to no one else, only to cross the old men sitting around the UCI boardroom table. I like to throw it out around every now and then and that is my rant for today. You see why search ourselves out and tackle some of the issues in the sport that actually matter like banning that idiot Nasr Buhani. Well man, I'm going to chat to you tomorrow and I'm back tomorrow with Alpason Fenix Reuter NeoPro JVoyne. J story is absolutely incredible because J was a continental Reuter last year over in Australia with neurocontinental and he won the Zwift Academy this year so he was the best Zwift rider in the world and as a result he's managed to snag himself a one year deal as a teammate of Machu Vanderpaul so I caught up with him. He's moved from Australia over to Gerona, he's kicking off his season in the tour of Torqui. I talked to him about this crazy transition from riding to the continental team and having the boys own tires and pay his own way last season to now being with one of the biggest teams in the world and a teammate of the biggest star in the sport. It's a brilliant interview, he's a super nice guy and I'm excited to bring you to that. Bring you that interview tomorrow. Until then Roadman, Jatiden, ride safe. Hey everybody, it's Anthony again. Really quick, I want to invite you to join arguably the best team I've ever put out inside the Roadman community. It's a challenge. It's a challenge called a 14-day Kickstarter challenge. So regardless of where your fitness is at right now, this is going to be the catalyst for making you faster and making you leaner. I've created this challenge to take the guesswork out of everything. It's 14 days of training plans, regardless of what your level is. There's a master's beginner, advanced, there's meal plans, shopping list, and even a video course holding your hand and talking you through at all. So what I recommend you do right now is just stop everything, press pause on this audio and go to roadmansoycling.com forward slash 14 day or check out the link in the bio that roadmansoycling.com slash 14 day.