Froome's Tour selection: head vs heart
Roadman today I want to talk about Chris Froome and his Tour de France selection. Let's cue 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 and this podcast will give you the answers. My name is Anthony Walsh and welcome to the Roadman Podcast. Rodeman, welcome back to another Rodeman Cycling Podcast and today I want to talk about something that shouldn't be controversial but is the inclusion of a four time Tour de France winner in the Tour de France starting team for Israel startup nation. It is obviously Chris Frill and he had that absolutely horrific injury a couple of years ago before the Criterion the Dauphinae, he was out trying them as time trial bike. I think the accounts of what actually happened are a little bit vague. I think he took his hands off the bars, was caught by a wind, brought him into a wall fast and it was really bad. Career ending injuries for most people and if it wasn't for the amazing medical care that any else, the deep pockets of film plus the advances in sports science and medicine, you wouldn't be seeing from him back on a bike. Nevertheless, in this debate what I want to try and do is try and get more into the debate of head versus heart because I think even if you were never a film fan the fact that the lad has milled himself into a wall almost end in his career we're all kind of rooting for him on the comeback trail. Well I feel like most people are rooting for him on the comeback trail. I certainly am but does that mean he should be selected for Israel's start-up nation for the Tour de France? That's what we're going to talk about. Before I dive into that road, man, let me just remind you about patreon and i say it every day about patreon and it's not a dispassionate ad to start the patreon. i'm working for free on the podcast guys and this is your chance to pay me for my work. the podcast is working off a model of soundness. it's working off a model of if you're enjoying the podcast and you think it's valuable and think it should stay around make a small donation, the price for a couple of coffees or a beer once a month that keeps the podcast on the road and it keeps me known that you're listening on the fireland and it's valuable to you and I think that's super important as well. So you can make that small contribution, it's over on patreon.com forward slash antony underscore watch the link is in the bio it takes about two minutes to set it up even if you don't have a patreon account and you can cancel it anytime you want. So please Robin do tip over there because some of the content if I do impartially say some myself that's fint huff the interview yesterday was fucking outrageously good. I could have chatted to Sven for a long time. He is a super interesting guy and I've talked to some of the background team since in Mitchell and Scott in their sentence. Sven was cool long before, cool was even a thing. Sven was the original, the fucking fawns of Saiklyn and you just get that chatting to him. He is a dude on all levels. So go back and listen to yesterday's one. It's about an hour long. It's a brilliant interview with the former Maglia Rosawear and all around wild man Sven tough. Right from has been selected as road captain for Israel Star Art of the Nation for the Tour of France. I suppose the two questions I want to answer. Firstly, should he be selected at all? And then secondly, let's have a look at this idea as road captain. Should he be selected at all? He's really been struggling in the run up to the Tour of France and all the preparation races he has been dropped. And when you marry that with the fact that others come to the Tour of France and they up at a level.
Froome as road captain?
Like it's marginal, like he definitely shouldn't have been selected as team later. I think that's correct. And you also have to consider the torte france. It's like a media magnifying glass. It's a spotlight on everything everyone does. And from as a four time winner, I think the highest paid rider in cycling. What's going to happen with that is he's going to have this extra media attention on his quite poor form. Whether he can deal with that or not, I'm not sure. We'll circle back at the very end to whether you should be selected at all or not, but let's first consider this idea of Frum as road captain. Mike Woods has gone in as team leader, which a role he's never played before, especially in a race as big as the Tour de France and, you know, I've had Mike on the podcast and he's a great guy. But Frum as road captain is, for me, when I think of a road captain, I think of a robust enforcer, Tink, Luke Rowe, Tink Tony Martin. You remember the scene in the two of them clashing heads last year in the Tour de France? The Tony Martin might have even got the Squalaford for that, but that's what the road cap that is. There to get shit done, lad, in the team. There to lad who roids on the front of the bunch, you know, one minute into the race because there's a breakdown that they don't like to look off. There to lads who are bringing team leaders up and chaperon them through crosswind sections, cobbled sections. There to go easy stick on the front to bring a move back. Here you go to get bottles, you would have positioned riders into key parts of races who are riding on the front, coming into bunch sprints in the notoriously dangerous force week. They're riding on the front full gas to keep their team leaders out of the wind, keep them out of jeopardy. None of these things are anything we've ever seen through them doing before. It's not the same as being a climb in the mistake. It's not the same as when Froome is ridden in support of Grand Thomas or Richie Port in the past and he's the last climb in the Mystique, because when you're the last climb in the Mystique, you're not far off the front of the race, you don't have that much of a pedal into the finish line on your own. But there's a potential for a room to be battling time cuts, like any road captain. And this is something he's never faced before. Like there's a real scenario where Israel start up nation need to control a move that's gone, because it's, you know, the politics of the day, it's fallen on them to control an early move that's gone that they don't like the mix up of that there's other GC rotors in it and Froome has to ride full gas inside the first 10 minutes of a boy grace give absolutely everything of himself for his teammates get dropped and ride the next 200 kilometers either solo or in a small group fighting for the time limit that's very very real scenario that this isn't a far-fetched scenario in painting and we have never ever seen Froome do do that before. And you know, the great champion that threw me is there's certain characteristics that make you a great champion. And they're not always the same characteristics that make you brilliant in servitude of others. So I don't know, I'm super interested and I'm almost a little bit like watching a training crash coming into this Tour de France like, oh, do I want to see such a great champion fall on a part in such a public stage? So I I don't know, I don't know folks. I don't know if he should have been brought to the Tour de France. Does he merit selection for the Tour de France? Yeah, I think he does. I think he's shown enough in the preparation races, definitely not to be team later, but to be a member of the team. And you can't, even if you take the romanticism out of it and the heart versus head debate, you take the heart part out of it.
Form, experience, and the verdict
And your park has amazing previous Tour de France victories. You can't ignore his experience as Palmaris because he brings that currently to the table with him. So when you marry his experience with his current form, yeah, he probably does deserve a place on Merris in the Tour de France line up with Israel. But does that make it a good idea for him to, you know, be under this media spotlight in a role that he's never done before? I don't know, I'm completely undecided. And I think that ultimately, for whom should have been the man to make that call. And I hope that he was the man to make that call. I didn't come from Huyers Up because it's gonna be an embarrassing place for from if he hasn't got form and the media spotlight is on him all week all three weeks and coupling that with he's gonna have to be getting bottles he's gonna be in situations where he's never been before it's super interesting we're only just over a week away from the start of the Tour of France like fuck if flew around fast like I know I took my little bit of a post-jure break but the tour has come fast. I'm only back into it this week. Loads more amazing guests in the line up for the coming weeks, but that's Fentuff one yesterday. It's definitely worth listening to Roadman if you haven't listened to it already. Roadman do all the usual things. The podcast that it grows by I'm not always brilliant to tell you this stuff, but it makes such a difference wherever you're listening to the podcast. Subscribe to it, comment on it and share it around with friends because sharing it around with friends is so powerful, especially if you're in other countries. It's just, it's brilliant getting that reach into other countries where I wouldn't normally get that reach and that happens by somebody that's in Irish land listening to it in the States and they share it with their cycling club over there. And before you know, we have a little cluster in New York. So please, if you're enjoying the podcast, do those few things and follow me over on social media on Instagram at roman.s. Roman, thank you for joining me and I shall chat to you AGAIN TOMORROW! Okay, stop what you're doing. It's Anthony again. I want to talk to you for one second about the next step in the roadman journey. I'm laying down a challenge for you. It's called the 8-Week Challenge. So for 8 weeks, I'm challenging you to be the very best version of yourself. Whatever that is. For 8 weeks, I want to take you under my wing and I want to personally build for you the customized training plan on our analytics platform. plan it's gonna be laser focused on your goal and I'm gonna navigate around your life, your work, your social commitments so don't worry about what your circumstances are right now. I remember after I took some time out of cycling and I went off and taught a really big businessman, I came back and I realized I wanted to get into cycling but I knew after a bit the training alone it actually wasn't making me any fitter. My needs is an entire system it needs a 360 overhaul so So for the first time ever, I want to share with you this exact system I used to get back in shape. I'm talking stuff like I'm going to give you my morning routines, the cold therapy I used, the cookbooks and recipes I used, and even the motivational audios I listened to get back on track. So right now what I want you to do is pause this audio, go to www.roadmancycling.com forward slash eight week, or check out the link in the bio, click that. So one more time at roadmancycling.com forward slash eight weeks. Chatty all soon.