Roadman, it is stage 15 of this year's Tour de France
Roadman, it is stage 15 of this year's Tour de France. It's the one we've been waiting for. La Caul de Grand Columbier. 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. This podcast will give you the answers. My name is Anthony Welch, and welcome to the Roadman Podcast. Rode men, welcome back to another roadman podcast guys. It's been stage 15. One that a lot of us have been looking forward to when the Tour de France route got announced back in October. This was definitely one of the standout stages. I said it two hundred eight because it was 10,000 feet of climbing that it was the Queen's stage. I don't know, possibly is an argument to say this is the Queen's stage, possibly there's an argument to say the time trial on next comment Saturday, up the planch the bell feel as the queen stage. Who knows, there is a queen stage. I don't know which one it is, maybe you do, but this was definitely a very decisive stage and it blew to absolute shit. I'm going to talk about that in one second. I want to just let you in on a little something here we're going to do, we're going to do a little bit of a trust tree, circle of trust I'm back doing a bit of training. This year has been a strange year for me with COVID and all the race has been called off. But there's a buddy of mine, Sean McKenna, some of you might know, Sean's, you know, he's ex on post-shine reaction. He's, you know, he's been a pretty big, he's been a pretty big, a prominent trainer partner for me for a number of years. And he's a coach as well for a one coaching. Roadman coaching, should I say, a roadman's But myself and Sean had ourselves a little wager. The National Championships are three weeks away. Neither of us are really trying that much. We haven't been riding our bikes, but we haven't been trying and that's structured through lockdown because a lot of the races are off. So three weeks to go, we said, you know what? We're going to have a little wager. So we had a little wager between me and Sean, the price for the lunch. That's the who's going to finish a head of who in nationals. So nationals is three weeks away. obviously a lot of big boys are probably becoming home. Nick I was the only tour de France at the moment but you know I started training as well. I was out this morning at five hours this morning and I'm feeling it now but what I wanted to tell you this story is because Sean is just such a Judas. He claimed no I'm not really trying and now bear in mind we're trying to partner. He's like I don't know if I'm gonna try and really today I might go and do a gravel ride or something and the sneaky bastards where did I catch him? I caught him on the local, not the local climb, I caught them in the mountains, out doing sneaky intervals. So that's it, clubs are off. If you're listening, you're on those three weeks and you're going to get served. So that's that bit of business covered and that's the important business for today. Now let's move on to stage 15 of the Tour de France. The brakes have been getting very little leeway with the format and the closeness of the Green Jersey competition and today it was no exception. Again, we had a break hoovering up some of the sprint points, but the sprint teams, they want to make sure there's something left to scrap for. Bennett's boys made sure Sam had points to sprint for. But not only that, they sprinted again with Bennett and their lead out man. Meaning they'd have probably been Sagin, a point so Sagin was to hoard in the bunch sprint behind Bennett and his lead out man, Markov, I think it was, which is a sneaky little tactic. I haven't actually seen that before. Now I know back before I really was a cycling aficionado. I think there was a super-toyce with Robbie McKeon. There was a super-toyce green jersey battle that went all the way down to Paris. I don't know what year that was, but that I've heard has been the closest since this one, but we're going to the Paris for this one. This is going to be epic, green battle all the way.
Grand Columbia was what we were waiting for all day, and it was the…
The Grand Columbia was what we were waiting for all day, and it was the sort of daunting target in the back of everyone's mind, but jumbo-vismas set this temple all day where they just put the hurt on people and the race just got spat out the back, constantly losing men out the back all day. I don't even know where to start talking about this kid without fan art. You've heard me on the podcast talking about Wout already. If you're not a regular listener of the podcast, Wout has been world-cycle across champion, He's European time trial champion. He wants Strata Bianchi. He won Milan Sanremo. He's won sprint stages in the tour. He's won sprint stages in the tour, even after he's been called upon to work early in the stage. And he's climbing the mystique now in the Huy Mountains. And we'd seen it earlier in the race, but the display we've seen from Walthfarnart today, it's one for the ages. Walthfarnart rode the GC contenders from other teams out of the race. Think about that for a second. Yumbovismus sprinter in inverted commas, Rode, Aegon Barnard, the defendant champion, out of the Tour de France. Let that sink in. Quintana out of the Tour de France. Martin out of contention. These guys are gone because of Wote Van Art. It was incredible. Wote Van Art set a tempo on the front which was insane. He was melting faces. And when he pulled off, the devastation was unreal. And the devastation at the end of the day for Bernal, the defending Tour de France champion. It's over seven minutes. He lost at the top of the Grand Colombia, like G'on, irivi de archee, see a good noise. Thanks for coming Bernal. He is out of contention for this year's Tour de France. I've seen at the finish line, he was saying that from the first climb I wasn't going well. I almost got dropped there. All day I've been lacking power. I feel like I've lost three years of my life but that's cycling, it's like that. Oh my god, on that climb itself he said I was waiting for a miracle that obviously failed to happen. Seven minutes, seven minutes. I just, I couldn't believe what I was saying today when I seen him just the tempo that we would say it was incredible. Now we know Quintana is historically prone to this completely falling apart and I had picked Quintana and tipped Quintana as being someone who could potentially go for the podium but that's falling apart from today's about bad day for Colombia. Real bad day for Colombia. Quintana historically has fallen apart. I remember one one two a couple of years ago completely. There's a point in stage race where he's just one of those guys I wouldn't want on my team. He seems to have a cyanoid pale in his back pocket and he takes the L signing IPL and just gone. Good luck. Doomlan again was incredible. This should be renamed the Yumbo Visma show today because it's just a roll call of honour from these Yumbo Visma warriors, soldiers that just rip this race apart and we're seeing gates attacking and it was a sting and look and attack. One of the best climbers in the world and what the Yumbo do, they don't even blink. Doomlan just set to tempo, stays at work, Yates gets eight seconds, goes back to six seconds, goes back to four seconds. Duma land just rolls up on him, as if like, yeah, don't do that again. Like when he bitch slapped Carapaz last week where he just set the Carapaz, gave him a look up and down and said, let the big boys work. He done something similar to Yates today and it was, it was, it was kind of funny to watch. It was hard to watch. So in the finish, we just had them winding up this tempo. Dumeland pulled off at about a kilometer to go. They still had Seppkos, they still had Roglic. Roglic went, Seppkos came over the top. At the end of the day, we had this Slovenian kid who, you know, he's making all the headlines at the moment. Pogacha went in the stage from Roglic and Port. Bernal seven minutes back. Importantly on the finish line, Pogacha's after picking a 10 second bonus open. Roglic has only got six seconds. So Pogacha's moved from 44 seconds in her ears on the general classification to 40 seconds on the rears. Now the commentators on EuroSport, they must be looking at a different GC because they think it's sown up. This Tour de France is going down to the Warrior.
I'm talking, we're going down to the Saturday
Like I'm talking, we're going down to the Saturday. This time troll up will plunge the bell fee. This is a Tour de France for the ages. This is gonna be Lamont, Finion, time troll all over again. Because we've a lot of hard days coming up in the last week in the Tour. Everyone's talked about the last week. This very little separating, Pogacha and Roglich, but Pogacha is getting the edge. He's nudging back 10 seconds here, 5 seconds there. If we go into that last edge with a 10-15 second deficit for Pogacha, don't forget, this kid is one of the best time trialists in the world and it finishes on La Plagia Belfis which is super hard. It's gonna be epic. I'm literally edging the seed stuff for this last week. We have a Colombian on the podium, Rigoberto or ran or ran. So good, they named them twice at 134. We've superman Lopez at 135 and we've Yates out 203. So the battle for that podium is actually really, it's an exciting one as well. And I often talk about the Tour de France is just so fascinating because you have a race within a race within a race within a race. So you've all these derivatives, you have the main GC race, you have the climbers battle, you have the green jersey, which is fascinating, young rider and then you've deposed him and that's what makes it so interesting to watch it unfold because he's a stage like today and on a climb if Yates attacks who sixt on GC and he's two minutes in trade-down, immediately Roggich doesn't need to be doubt worried because if it's five kilometers from the top of a climb, Roggich is kind of going, you know, Yates is not going to take two minutes out of me in five K but who does start getting worried is Lopez and Iran because he's only 15 and 20 seconds behind them, so then they start getting worried and they start sending teammates to the front, so always be looking when you see these attacks, especially in the final. Okay, who's attacking? Now who's that kind of concern? And watch the dynamic in the Peloton change, because a Yates attack will concern guys around him on GC. Even somebody who's behind him and is hoping to leapfrog him that day, you'll see them just summon their lieutenants to the front to put out that fire. So it's fascinating to watch it unfold, it's like chess on wheels and that's why I just love watching it. You can legitimately watch four or five hours of it and just watch the pawns earlier on the domestiques. How are they being moved? How are they being utilized? Because everything happens for a reason on it. What I was a little disappointed today was Pagacha. He was clearly super strong in the final that he didn't just give a little test with two 3K to go and try and get a little bit more time back. Is that tactical? Did he knows he's super strong and he doesn't want to take the jersey because he's going to have to defend the jersey and he doesn't have the team to defend the jersey? That's one possibility. Another possibility is he just wasn't feeling that good and he just mustered up enough for the sprint. I had seen some little bit of debate on twitter. People saying potentially did Roglage gift them the stage? No way did Roglage gift them that stage. Bonus seconds on the line, Tour de France going to the war, no way Roglage has given up for 4 seconds. Interesting, it was Cepcoce's birthday today. Cepcoce Roglage's chief climbing domestic. It looked at one point like they were trying to set Cepcoce up for the win, but it just didn't happen in the end. It was too important and was too much at stake in those bonus seconds. Big story today really is not about who's taking steps forward, it's about who's taking steps back. We've Bernal effectively out at Tour de France content, no, he's not effectively, I'm just strongly in words for the sake of there, he's out of contention for Tour de France. Now this is going to raise questions about team Ineos selection, where they justified in leaving from at home, where they justified in leaving Garand Thomas at home. Garand Thomas was second yesterday in Toronto, Adriatico or the day before in the hilltop finish, so he clearly has some legs, but he didn't ride that well in the Dauphane. Personally, I think the Fréon decision is a good one to leave Fréon at home. He's such a big character, he's such a big history of Fréon, the Tour de France, it's inseparable.
He's a five-time winner, can't go there and collect bottles
He's a five-time winner, can't go there and collect bottles. He wasn't in shape to win the Tour de France, they've in Youser Sky or whatever you want to call them, the Grenadiers. They've historically been ruthless when it came to team leadership decisions and they chopped Wiggins with almost zero sentimentality in favor of frame and they don't know again. I think that was a good decision. Grant Thomas is a more difficult one to justify because Thomas wasn't good for him in the Dauphiné although not sparkling but he's in good for him now in Treno Adriatico. It would have been amazing for him to have a backup plan. But I think the broader question about Inyos is, what the fuck is going on? Who is coaching them or what has happened? Like they're falling to shit. We see on the front the bunch today, like just ten lads left in the group and there's five yum bovisma. This used to be Inyos. Like Sivikovsky. You know, where Karapas, no no Karapas had a crash today but he hasn't been at the point in the end. What's happened? Like they've gone to pieces. of completely taking the mantle as the super team. So yeah, complete head scratcher for the Cyclone fans and I'm sure if the team in the house coach is looking at training for us, looking at, he's going to have questions to answer. And I'm sure he's clinging on and looking to see what happened now because it looks like the whole team is gone shit. I think it's Tim Kerishin is the performance director or the training coach director of performance or whatever you want to call it for. Any else, copy wrong, copy your shame and handle. They've gone to shit whether people have come out with lockdown differently because some countries had lockdown where you could only try and endorse thinking Italy, I'm thinking France, Spain, Gerona for a period. Whereas other countries like the Slovenians, Pogacha and Roglich, you could try and like They had their nationals during lockdown for other people. You know, because we had Yanni Brackovich on the podcast just before nationals, and he was trying it away at altitude. So all this stuff plays a role. And Saigon as well, you know, he's not a peak form. And, you know, that's one of the reasons. I personally think he just likes the party likes it all a bit too much. Like, it's partying on the yachts. But when you give a kid from Slovenia, or, you know, you give him what Saigon's contract, five million a year. It does bad things. It does bad things. Money will do bad things to a good man. Tomorrow we have a rest day. We have a rest day on the Tour de France and we have a rest day on the roadman podcast. Hope you've been enjoying the roadman podcast so far. It's been, it's been great having an outlet because otherwise I'm just going to be talking to my girlfriend Sarah and I'm going to be wrecking her head about cycling. It's great to have this outlet to talk to you guys and have this doy log and I love that it is a dialogue and some of you are hitting me up on Instagram with your thoughts on the stage. Just keep coming with that and if at any point those messages become annoying, you'll hear me saying it. Folks, before I finish, I would just ask you to head on over to patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore Walter patreon's how I fund this podcast. That's how I support the podcast. A buddy remark recently how much the audio has improved in the last couple of months and that's just completely down to you guys and support I've got on Patreon. So, thanks very much for Patreon support and it's needed now more than ever during the Tour de France. So, if you want to buy me the price of a beer, the price of a coffee once a month to say thanks for the podcast, if you're getting some value from it, where you can do that is patreon.com. I'm going to leave the link in the description down below. Folks, that's been it. If we're into the second rest day at the Tour de France and we are finally poisoned the Yellow Jersey battle and we're finally poisoned the Green Jersey battle, I cannot wait, enjoy the rest day and ride safe after I ride men.