Put the phone on airplane mode, stick the auto responder on your…
Put the phone on airplane mode, stick the auto responder on your email, lock yourself in a room, it's the queen stage of this year's Tour de France, 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 on this podcast, we'll give you the answers. My name is Anthony Walsh and welcome to the Roadman Podcast. Well folks, welcome back to the Roadman Podcast. I hope everybody has had a great day. I want to start off this podcast with Erin Moi frustration. Anyone who's a regular listener, you'll know this podcast, it's more than cycling news. It's my internal stream of consciousness. I think WB Yates had that kind of phrase, stream of consciousness. Now I'm borrowing from the great Irish literary man. Today I had a busy day. I was hopping around the city, had a couple of meetings to do, had a couple of Zoom calls and I just knew I wasn't going to get to sit and watch in an uninterrupted footage of this year's Queen's Stage, Stage Touring of the Tour de France. So I said to myself, instead of watching it in piecemeal and not getting the full effect, I'm going to switch off my mobile phone, I'm going to stick it on airplane mode, I'm going to avoid social media sites and the like, and I'm going to watch it on EuroSport player later on this evening. I got home later on this evening, I flick into my EuroSport player and guess what EuroSport have stuck as the thumbnail for the fucking stage that I've waited all day to watch. Spoiler alert, they've stuck the winner of the stage in the thumbnail. You miserable bastards. You really want to die. So I wanted to start off the podcast on that sour note and just say, you're a sport. Ugh. There's not a word for it. It's a sound more than a word. It comes from the soul. So there you go. I'm going to jump into this podcast, but before I do, I would ask you all to head on over to patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch. That's the way you support this podcast. Everyone's into me DMS and they're saying I love the podcast. How can I support it? And that's how you can support that. I love the idea of patreon. It's the non-reliance on a single brand. No one having creative control. And at this point in the podcasts evolution, that's where we're at. No one brand has creative control on this podcast. It's you guys, the listeners that determined the creative direction, obviously along with myself. So, if you think you're getting enough value out of this to buy me a coffee, I'd encourage you to not give your money to your host board. They're a shitty thumbnail creator, but instead, jump on over to Patreon.com. I'm going to stick a link below. You can buy me a coffee, buy me a beer. Unfortunately, it's like 5 euro a month, it won't extend to a beer in Ireland, because at the moment you need to buy a beer with a Toaster J sandwich, because somehow, there's magical ingredients in toasted cheese sandwiches and they protect you from COVID-19. But that is a discussion for another day. We had a big break on today. But before we had that, we had the best team in this year's Tour de France, Yumbo Visma, the Alpha Males, set an a horribly relentless pace in the forced-hour race and chopped the legs out of a lot of people. So when the break did go, the break went with real contenders. And at the business end of the break we had tree roiders still left on our summer finish today and they were Schachmann from Borahansgrove, Kamna from Borahansgrove and Martiness from EF Education. Now if there wasn't a thumbnail what Martiness I would have been left with intrigue until the final meters of this one because we had Schachmann out front and Kamna catching a roid off Martiness all the way up but it just went to show you that you shouldn't be daunted but a 211 set off because Martin is he had the belief to know on the steep gradients the Colombian-born of altitude knew when it pitched up in the last two kilometers of this race that he had when it took to shake off the two guys and he did it took till the close meters to really shake the guys and but fair play to Schachman because the Boerra Reuter Schachman he was riding with a taped up collarbone and I know we're in this age where we trivialize accidents and go, it's just a collarbone.
He crashed into Lombardy where a spectator pulled out if you remember…
And he crashed into Lombardy where a spectator pulled out if you remember in the closing kilometers and he nailed himself. Like, how old was it a car in the closing kilometers of a race like Lombardy? I don't know. But he nailed himself and he broke his collarbone. And I've been that soldier in, I think it was 2000 and 2014. I broke a collarbone. Geez, I've broke that many collarbones now. I'm struggling to even think where I broke this collarbone. I broke a collarbone in a criterium in Delray Beach. That makes me sound all windswept and exotic. And that was especially, that was my most spectacular crash because I hit an off-camber corner on cobbles on a Saturday night race with beer spilled on it. I went over to barriers and into some girls dinner table that was sitting down and joining a nice beach-soid dinner. So I definitely ruined every evening. I'm breaking collarbone pretty much around my evening. I tried to race the Ross and that was I think four weeks later I'd had the operation on the collarbone and I'd heard this trivia language like oh it's just a collarbone get a pinned I raced the Ross I got around the eight days let me tell you it hurts like a motorfucker every time you hit a pothole every time you try and reach for your bottle reach for your pocket so to think the Shaqman's back at the front of some of the biggest races in the world four weeks after breaking his collarbone, hats off, but it just goes to show how hard these lads are. In my opinion, the hardest athletes in the world, they hit the concrete and they bounce and they get up and they never ask a question. It's just part of the job. As the French would say, it's le maitier, the work ethic and the dedication of just hitting that concrete and bouncing up. The race behind, we had two races, we had that upfront where we had Martin as pulling away from the two boys for a Colombian win, Chappal, Colombians, They didn't have it all their way back in the main battle, the GC battle, because we had my favorite moment at the Tour de France so far. We had the Inio's Grenadiers, finally the pre-race favourites commented a front and imposing themselves on the front of this boy Grace. They have former world champion Kiekowski, hits the front, Carapaz, the 0 champion comes true. And Yumbor all up on them and after Carapaz's wack the full gas, Yumbor all up, still 4 guys in the group. Tom Dumaland gives him this look and it was like a look of lasers coming out of his eyes and he just looked at him as much to say. It was like Rocky looking at Apollo Creed and just looking and up and down and going. Is that all you have? Yeah, step aside buddy. Let the big boys go to work and then the Yumbo train, the four boys hit the front and they ripped shit to pieces. The only man left in this year's race to can attack and stick it up to Yumbo Wiseman, it's Podgecar and he done it again and he whacked it on the steep gradients got that separation and we had a Slovenian it's almost like they're working as teammates at the moment Podgecar and Roglitch, they were coming in decimated the rest of the bunch. Columbians are coming in just behind with Quintana, with Bernal, with Uran, Quintana incidentally had a bad crash today as did, that was a bad day for the French, Bardae crashed, Wicke and Tana, but it turns out Bardet has actually left the sort of France now with a concussion. We talked about concussions yesterday. They're not to be joked about they're taking seriously these days and they're the injury you can't see. It's like the gift that keeps on giving. You just don't know when you're recovered from them. So hopefully, you know, talk with Bardet and, you know, if he's listening bonchons on the recovery Bardet. Um, yep, it's a nasty one. So hopefully he's alright. Cantana actually pieced himself back together. Okay. And he finished with Bernal, who's definitely shown signs of weakness. And you got to think that any else busts, like think about the momentum in the two different bosses going home. If the young Bo Viz Maguise, they must be just on a high because any else true, everything they had at them.
On a stage where we anticipated Bernal commented a front to defend…
On a stage where we anticipated Bernal commented a front to defend the champion and pose themselves on this race. Instead, like the teams talk before the race would have been okay carapas you take it up make people suffer a Bernal You kick off that this is the big moment and the thing when carapas is lieutenant attacks that there's four young Bo Vizmalads Still there that Real momentum swing around we know in sports that the breaking ball the rub of the green the collar and golf You know strikeers and football. It's just one bouncing in off your shin momentum It's a cruel beast and the momentum is definitely with young Bo Vizmal at the moment Behind, we had some writers who are, you know, no one's talking to him much about them, but they're writing well, Richie Port, Landa and Superman Lopez were best at the rest behind, and they didn't give away that many seconds, a handful of seconds, to the two Slovenians. We're set for a super battle. Roglich looks like he's just cruising at the moment, and his only rival looks to be Taji Pajakar, the 22-year-old who's honestly, James Nestor, we talked about breeding recently in a recent podcast and the idea of nose breeding. Pajakar looks like he's nose breeding on these climbs, he just looks at ease and for 22 year old, a maturity he's shown on and off the bike. It's brilliant. Bernal lost 46 seconds today. Pajakar has stepped up to second on GC now and he's at 44 seconds and when you think about we've a lot of hard racing left to go and And the second last day before we get to Paris, remember Paris is traditionally a neutralized stage where it's a procession and we drink some champagne and I say we, like I'm there with the lads, like I've put in the hard work. I'm sitting at home here just finished eating meatballs and I'm saying we, caught yourself on. And the lads get into Paris, that's traditionally a neutralized stage. So the last stage proper is the Saturday before Paris and it's a mountain time trial. If Tajé Pajakar is within strike and distance 10, 15 seconds on this, we could have a historic Saturday, like I'm thinking back, I wasn't old enough to enjoy it at the time, but as a cycling fan, a historian of cycling, I've loved that footage, as I'm sure you have, of Greg Lamont on the time trial, and when Greg Lamont went on against Laurent Fignon, where Greg Lamont became the first American to win the Tour de France, and that epic footage we've seen, like we could be in for a repeat of this. This is just such a finely poised Tour de France icon way. Today's Queen's stage did not disappoint. It was absolutely epic. Thanks for joining me for the recap of this stage and you know what, you know what now. I'm gonna be back tomorrow for stage 14 of the Tour de France. Tomorrow looks set for, it's kind of, it's finely balanced between sprinters and breakaway day. I don't even, I'm gonna call it as cuissons or cousins, however you pronounce it as the winner for tomorrow. Yeah, it's for me it's a breakaway, but who knows the way the green jersey's been contested this year. Don't forget to head on over to patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch. If you're anything like me, you always put this stuff off. I know I support the blind boy podcast and a bunch of other podcasts and I do support independent creators because I think it's right that they're paying for their work. If you're anything like me, you would have put that decision off for a long, long time. So now I'd ask you to channel this mantra we've had through the tour, it's just to do it now. Just ask the podcast, finish this, head on over to Patreon and get that piece of business done and I will join you again tomorrow. Right safe out there, roadman and chat to you then.