THEMOVE - Battle for 2nd or 3rd | Tour De France 2024 Stage 17 | JB2

Episode Date: July 17, 2024

Johan breaks down this dynamic stage and explains why the breakaway was so hard to make, followed by his analysis of the win. We also spent time on what can happen as Remco seems to be gaining momentum and Jonas may explode trying to win vs. defending his position.

I have the feeling now, if not at the beginning of today, definitely by the end of today, Remco is looking forward and Jonas, who's been saying, I'm here to win. This race is not over. Maybe now is starting to look backwards. He has to, he has no choice. Listen, he still has two minutes on Remco. Okay. So in theory, it should be enough. You know, you never know Remco is going to have a huge morale now. He did drop Jonas Vingegaard today. He did drop the winner of the last two Tour de France. That's not given to anybody.

He starts to feel the fatigue, Remco is going to have that in mind. And Jonas, I think he has to be realistic. And in Visma also, that it's better to defend the second place. Because, I mean, you could also say, you know, it doesn't really matter. You know, he's won the tour twice, whether he's second or third. It doesn't really matter as long as we try.

But I fear it's not going to work with Pogacar. He's basically untouchable at this moment. So we have an interesting battle on our hands there hello and welcome to jb square this is your additional show where uh to the move where you're gonna get like extra bonus of you johan brunil today i'm jb hager and of course johan bruniel is here he joined us on the move today so you're you're doing a lot a lot of work today yeah for sure oh my gosh i yeah i love you for that but we're gonna we're gonna dig in go a little bit deeper than we probably got to on the move this morning I particularly want to drill down a little bit more on this potential battle for between second and third between Jonas and Remco I really

want your thoughts on that but first thank you to our uh title sponsor for JB squared ketone IQ I've got my shot right here and it's going to be I i'm going to do the same thing jb first of four podcasts i need i need my brain to work properly so exactly so here we go there we go not only does it help you physically also with mental clarity which is why we're mostly on it during the tour and then you dug up some research that even helps with sleep so all these little things add up so anyway uh 30 off your first subscription order to ketone iq and you'll get a free six pack when you use the link ketone.com slash the move all right let's jump into stage 17 and sometimes we lead with the highlight i think think today, Johan, we'll talk about how this is built because this is a complicated stage. And this is a good chance for you to explain the dynamics of what was going on because there's a GC battle.

There was the Green Jersey battle. And that really affected teams working and and also a uh intermediate sprint what 120k in or something like that 115 115 which is a unique scenario so so let me let me turn it over to you and you can kind of uh explain how this unfolded and why this is such a a unique stage and also another another factor jb is the fact that there's a bunch of teams who haven't won anything, who are not in GC, who have not gotten any results, and this is the last of two chances, today and tomorrow, to go and break away. So it looked like everybody wanted to be in the break. No breakaway was valid. It was a super fast start.

In the beginning, actually, there was a bit of crosswind also. And we could see that there was 20, 30 guys dropped at some point with surprisingly two guys from UAE in there. So I thought, hmm, you know, I mean, there must be, I mean,

these are the kind of stages that as a team of the leader, this is a nightmare. It's terrible. You're used to pull at a constant speed. They're really good at that. In the end of a Grand Tour, the majority of the peloton have lost their punch. They can just go from A to B as fast as possible. They still go really fast, but they don't have that punch anymore.

And today we could see that, you know, like I think Tim Wellens was suffering quite a bit. I think Marc Soler was in the back. And actually also at some point, Adam Yates was in the back, top 10. He's in the back. And actually also at some point, Adam Yates was in the back, top 10. He's in seventh place. So I started to think, you know, this could be complicated for UAE. Now, of course, you know, you have Pogacar who rides around in the peloton like a fish in the water, you know, he just finds his way. But, you know, so early in the stage stage i'm pretty sure that they were quite stressed so from that moment on it's really the the goal of the team of the leader is really to let a breakaway go

and try to slow down the peloton so that everybody can regroup and he can find his teammates again and that did not happen i mean there was four guys who uh who went, really strong guys, Bob Jungels, Magnus Kort, Romain Gregoire and Tish Benut. So a guy from Wismar, but not a dangerous one. And you would say, well, this is a great break. Finally, the peloton is going to say, OK, this is it. You know, we won. We didn't make it to the break. Now, the problem was that a lot of these teams who haven't won anything were not in that break so they kept going and going and going and the terrain was actually very difficult there was no

classified climbs but it was constantly two three four percent uphill and you know you could there was bodies everywhere the sprinters i mean we straight away saw gaviria and uh and sam bennett uh abandoned now sprinters who said okay i mean i think these guys basically they probably started with the idea okay they know that it's over for them there's no more sprint stages but you know you don't want to you want to make it to paris right you want to finish the tour but once you're on or nice this year but yeah yeah yeah sorry sorry sorry i know you've been saying this to paris your whole life so yeah yeah uh but but i think like mentally it's so hard you know like all of a sudden you're in in the hurt box but you're by yourself and you say what am i doing here you know like mentally

we clearly see some benefit was meant it was over there was no chance he was going to make it to the finish today. It's funny you say that, do professional cyclists must often have moments where they go, what am I doing with my life? A lot of times. I mean, I've done it as an amateur you know i'm on some i'm out in some horrible weather on a five-hour ride with friends and then the temperature drops and i'm like what am i doing i could be doing anything else in the world at least those guys are getting paid well but then you come home jb and you're proud of yourself i know it's true You've done something and you know, the, the, the, the rush of, of, of adrenaline and, and, you know, uh, how do you call that? The serotonin. Yeah, it's true. The endorphins get going. Yeah, I know. I know. I know. But yeah, I just wonder if professional cyclists do that quite often. Oh, I mean, let me tell you, and especially in the grand tour, the, the 75%, if not more of the riders who are in the race,

they're saying, what am I doing here? What, what, what, what should I do? They know they can't abandon because there's that job they can't abandon. They can't leave their leader. They, they, you know, they need, they, they owe a certain respect to their team and, but they're just, they're riding suffering and, and, hey please you know niece show up yeah so then we finally did get to that intermediate sprint and we and we all were wondering if how gourmet was feeling feeling after he hit his knee pretty hard in his elbow and shoulder uh just the day before but well he answered that question yeah i mean that was an important one for for binyam girimai he

beat uh jasper phillipson uh that's quite the statement he beat him like showing that he was faster in that sprint uh it was slightly uphill so in theory it's a bit better for him uh and that's basically that's game over for green Jersey you know with that Sprint and that's it uh there's no chance anymore that I mean it mathematically I guess it's still possible but but it won't happen because yeah because gourmet will be right like you said this yesterday even if uh philipson wins guillermay is likely second or third yeah yeah. Yeah. Plus tomorrow it's the border of the sprint is after two cat tree climb. So none of them will be at the break. So the points will be gone.

And then the other stages are pure mountain stages, which none of them will be in the, in, in front when the sprint comes up. So, uh, you know, if, if Binyam Girmay stays on his bike and makes it to Nice, he's the winner of the green Jersey, which is huge. It's already huge that he wins three stages, right. But, uh, for, for him to win the green Jersey, I mean, that's, uh, that's quite something. I mean, Eritrea is going to go crazy. I'm looking forward to seeing how many uh just east africans in general are are in nice for the finish and to welcome him it's gonna be pretty wild yeah yeah

yeah no he's a he's a cult hero man yeah yeah i mean good for him listen i was happy to see i mean i'm also a fan of philipson of course, but I think Girmayi deserves this green jersey. You know, he fought for it. He almost, you know, lost it yesterday. You know, it could have been really bad, that crash. And, you know, we could have seen Girmayi, for example, not at the start this morning. So, you know, luckily he's okay.

And I saw an interview of him him he says he's really hurt his elbow and knee hurts a lot but it wasn't really visible in that sprint i mean he was he was he was amazing he was amazing uh then you know after that sprint this is after you know this is after 115 kilometers of full gas racing yeah they were they were at that point they were like at least 20 minutes ahead of schedule i think i heard them say like that's how fast they were going that was 60 kilometers left 60 kilometers left and then i saw this interview of adam blight interviewing andreas clear the director of ef and so they had made a plan. And for them, that sprint, that was kilometer zero of the race.

That's when the race started. It's like, it's even worse. When I said a few stages ago, okay, guys, after stage 40, this is even worse. I mean, these guys have been dying on the bike for 115K trying to you know cover the brakes missing the brake having to chase it down and then you hear okay this is kilometer zero guys

now it starts uh but hey they did a good job they um they had the plan uh um you know they had from what i could understand from the interview today was full ef for richard carapaz this was his stage full full gas for him um and carapaz uh had tried already a few times to go in the break finally he managed to get into that group of 40 riders huge group huge group i mean that's that shows you how how many guys wanted to be in the break and then how tired the peloton is. Because normally a group of 40 guys, you would never, ever, ever let that go because you never know what happens. But anyway, everybody was far behind in GC. So it kind of calmed down things a lot. at least uae had the chance to regroup their seven riders and to basically set uh a comfortable pace

towards the finish and we can talk a little bit later on what happened on that last climb but um from then on we knew that the the the the winner of the stage would be from the breakaway and that's that's that's what happened yeah so then uh simon yates goes who we did not see much of simon yates in the first half of this tour i heard he was pretty sick and he's coming on strong it's wild it's just hard to remember and comprehend it's a three-week race where you can be sick as a dog in week one and you just manage it to get through and then knowing how hard this tour started it's even more miraculous yeah and then you come around and and that happens it happens with sick with illnesses with crash I remember my first tour to France

JB I did in 1990 I started and just before the tour I got got sick. And in the first few days, I got bronchitis. And I was on antibiotics for the first 10 days. And somehow I managed to get through it. I mean, it was different because there was a lot of flat stages, a long time trial. I lost a bunch of time. And then finally, all of a sudden there was that this one day it started to change and then the end of this of the tour i was in the front in all the mountain stages i finished 16th in my first tour of rance and i got better and better so i mean it can i i've

experienced it myself so i can completely understand that somebody who's been you know having problems in the beginning uh then all of a sudden in the last week finds that extra gear. Also, because if you're feeling off or if you're sick, you know, you're trying to save as much possible energy. You don't fight for position. You're just hanging in there. And finally, all of that adds up. Then finally, when you get healthy, because three weeks is a long time, right?

So, I mean, you're not going to have a cold during three weeks. This can, you know, I've always said, you know, the Tour de France is the only sporting event that actually people go to have a haircut during the sporting event. It happens. Maybe cricket. No, those only go like three or four days, right? Depends on how fast your hair grows. Maybe the World Cup football, soccer. That's long.

We did get an email from a woman who does Iditarod in Alaska. That's the sled dog. Oh, okay, okay. Oh, wow. Yeah. I don't have her name in front of me, but she, you know, it's also an endurance race over many, many days. And, but she sent it in because remember when we were talking about Magnus Cort on the show and cause he's been showing the horrible hotel rooms that they sometimes stay in and he reviews them which he's very funny writer by the way she was going when we're doing the idea rod sometimes we sleep outside with our

dogs I would have given anything to have that yes there's always something better and always something worse isn't there okay Magnus court is funny I mean I think we all saw, you know, he took a bet. He had 170,000 followers on Instagram or something. And he said, okay, if I get to 200,000, I'm buying my mustache blue. I didn't know why he did that. He got it in one day, in one night, he got 200,000. Oh my gosh. So now he's riding around with a blue mustache well i just you know english as a second language his sense of humor in english is very good in my opinion i just he's a clever writer

uh so anyway i need to check out his instagram i i don't think i'm following it but I'll I will okay so uh Simon Yates goes on the attack and then we see carapaz make a a bridge again from a big group yeah which is very hard to do it's hard to make that bridge without somebody going with you well and also also you know the fact that he was waiting waiting waiting because those four riders were strong riders of course they've been out there for a long time. But, you know, initially they kept that gap, you know, Jungels and Magnus Kort and Gregoire and Benote, they're four strong climbers also. And so they kept that gap and just Carapaz was just waiting.

He knew he had to just do one big attack. And he let the other riders attack in between. And so they were close enough i think they were like 35 40 seconds on that uh on that second to last climb which was the hardest climb by the way and also if i'm not mistaken it was also the first ever alpine climb alpine pass used in the tour de france in the history of the tour de France. Today's second to last climb hard. So, I mean, he did an amazing attack. He caught the breakaway.

In the meantime, Simon Yates had attacked the front. He caught him and dropped him straight away. You know, these are two top level guys, you know, two Grand Tour winners. You know, Simon Yates won the Vuelta a few years ago, was fourth in the Tour de France. Carapaz won the Giro, was second in the Giro, was second in the Vuelta, third in the Tour. I mean, these are the big guys, you know.

So, yeah, Carapaz just gets better and better and better. And in any Grand Tour where he does not go for GC, he's been amazing. I mean, I think two years ago, he started the Vuelta for GC. He got in a crash, didn't

work out, took a few days easy, and then in the last 10 days, he won three stages in the Tour of spain so this is this type of guy who just has this incredible endurance and knows how to race and knows how to pick his moment and and today um in ef they absolutely knew that he was the guy you know clear said no today is for calapas we support him 100 100% with everybody and we think that he can make it. So there was no surprise there.

They announced their plan. Everybody knew in the front group also that Carapaz was going to go for it and he did it. Hats off to him. Amazing. He's now also joining the club of riders who have won stages in all three Grand Tours.

You know, he took the yellow jersey in the beginning of the tour. That's also now he wore, he had the leader's jersey in all three Grand Tours. Now also he won a stage in all three Grand Tours. Did you see this coming on with Carapaz? We talked about it a little bit on the move this morning, but I didn't see it in the, you know, the first week and a half of this tour. But I, what I shared on the move is I was asking, um, sir Bradley about Carapaz and he's like, you wait, he's,

he's going to come on in the third week. Like he saw something there. Did you see that? Yeah. I mean, I picked him for outcomes yesterday. So. going to come on in the third week like he saw something there did you see that yeah i mean i picked him for outcomes yesterday so well of course you did yeah good point it was it was my big outcome so um yeah you could see it you could see it coming you could see it coming he struggled in the first mountain stages then he decided okay gc is not for me. I'm not picking my stages. And he tried already a few times. And now today he got it, you know, and we're going to see more of him. That's got to be a hard thing transition.

If you've been a Grand Tour winner to be a stage hunter. It is. And there's nothing wrong with it. Like you said, he's in this elite club now with stage wins and all the grand tours. Yeah, he's in this elite club. But, you know, I mean, Carapaz is actually, I mean, I don't think he had to wait for this performance to be, you know, he won the Giro. He's been on the podium of all three grand tours. He's Olympic champion.

You know, it doesn't get much better than that. I mean, there's not that many riders in the Peloton who have that kind of Paul Morris, uh, you know, in terms of he's, he's amazing. He's a, he's a great rider. Uh, especially he's a great racer, you know, he's, he, and especially also what I find really attractive about him is his style. You know, the, the, the way he rides his bike, um, the way he moves, he moves a lot, especially when he goes full gas, he's all over the bike. And sometimes you have the impression that he's flying. He's actually not going that much faster than the rest, but he gives that, that impression. So obviously for the fans, that's super attractive. Uh, listen, he's a great rider. Uh, he, he, he delivers. I'm just laughing in my head. Cause when I was learning to ride and then race, I would see the guys that just rocked the, just are all over the bike. And I thought that was so

cool. It's, it's not necessarily the most efficient thing. It's not efficient. It's not efficient. It just looks cool. It looks good on TV, if you're on TV. Now let's talk about the GC battle. There's a few things in particular I want to talk about. The Team UAE and how they're looking right now. Pogacar's attack, which we were all kind of like, why? And then Remco going on the aggressive. So which one do you want to talk about first probably we touched on uae uh you know at the beginning of the stage i was i was thinking okay you know they're they're hurting and they did um it was not easy for

them but once the peloton slowed down uh you know they got all their guys together. They had two guys in the front, Marc Soler and Pavel Sivakov. Wisma had three guys in the front. They had Laporte and Van Aert and then Benot up front. But once they got to that last climb, initially they just started to ride, not with the intention to set a hard tempo because it was Nils Pollitt who was putting the pace, probably the heaviest rider on UAE. But then all of a sudden we saw this acceleration of Carlos Verona of Little Trek for Giulio Ciccone, I guess to test a few of the other guys who are top 10, because there's a huge battle going on for 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th, and 11th.

So there's this battle there. Those five riders want to be as high up as possible in the top 10. So Ciccone must be feeling good. Verona did an amazing job. And that actually, you know know selected the group of the first group a lot

there was only about 20 riders left and then we saw UAE starting to pace again with Almeida and Adam Yates there you could see

already okay you know UAE has three guys and with you know Almeida and Adam Yates and Pogacar, of course. And Jonas was by himself because Mathieu Jorgensen

and Wilco Kelderman got dropped. I said, oh, that's not good. You know, I mean, of course, Jonas just needs to try to follow, but it's always better to have somebody in case. Now, luckily, they had guys up front, which came in handy later on in the stage. But then, you know, when nobody expected, I definitely did not expect Pogacar to attack.

He attacked with 1.5k to go to the top of the climb. We see it here in the back, this attack. There's only 15 riders left, guess at that point and uh yeah we once again see that jonas tries to follow once again what do i see he looks back ramco's there ramco passes him this is the first time that we see ramco pass jonas and actually drop him. Say that again. That's important, what we saw today. It's the first time we've seen Remco pass and drop Jonas.

Yes, exactly. This is a big deal. We'll get more into that. So, you know, when I saw the attack of Pogacar, I was thinking, okay, what are you doing, man? Come on. You don't need to do this. In his interview after the race, he said, you know, well, yeah, I attacked.

I thought I was going to stretch my legs a bit. I don't really know why I attacked. I mean, the guy just, I mean, when he races, he races. He doesn't think about anything, right it it is of course it's super super attractive super nice for the fans but it's not smart yeah because you know it's it was closer to the finish than the other day yeah uh but you have the downhill uh i think what he probably didn't take into account is that jonas was going to find christophe Laporte, who was from tremendous help for Jonas in the downhill on the top of the climb.

So Laporte, big guy, huge power, had probably been soft pedaling in the break for quite a bit. And he was there at the right moment. And he brought Jonas, first of all, he brought Jonas back to Remco. And then they got back to Remco and then they got back to Pugacar who in the meantime had found Pavel Sivakov

who came from the front but the attack was basically neutralized and then you know the whole battle for the stage win is going on in front Carapaz wins easily and then we see

on the last climb, which was a three and a half kilometer climb, about 5% average, so not super steep. We see a bit of looking at each other, Jonas and Tadej

and all of a sudden, Remco takes advantage of that supervision and he attacks I think it was more a tactical attack than something else but still I mean you have to have the legs to be able to attack it on the last climb after such a hard stage and then it was

Jonas who was in the defense and luckily he finds Walt Van Aert and Tishjpenot who are coming back from the front. So it was basically, it was as if it was planned. It was not planned like this, I'm sure. But it looked like, it was like textbook, this is the plan, you send guys in the front, you have them brought back. And luckily for Jonas, they were there. Remco had the same situation. He took a few seconds and he got together with Jan Hirt,

who also came back from the front brake. So the three first riders in the GC got riders that were in the brake who dropped back and could pace them. Remco had a good kilometer at the wheel of Jan Hirt and then he went himself. And then there you could see that Jonas is, in my

opinion, starting to... I mean, I'm not going to say he's fading away, right? But he's a bit off compared to where he was a week ago because he stayed at the wheel of Tisbenot. Normally, when Hirt had his turn done and Remco went,

Jonas should have started to go by himself. And he stayed at the wheel of Tisbenot, which that pace was definitely not going to match the pace of Remco. He needed that wheel. Yeah, and that was obviously really good for today, but Pogacar attacked really late, so he only took two seconds on Jonas

because also he was not steep anymore. But it's a sign. It's a sign that, I mean, Wismar is strong. I mean, tactically, they were really good today. But I fear that Jonas is, is, has reached his, his maximum and that he needs to start to think about defending second place in my opinion. Okay. Let's talk about that.

Looking forward and looking back. All right. Cause in an interview a few days ago, the post race, cause they they're talking to RIMCO every day cause he's in the white jersey and they specifically asked him are you looking forward or looking back and without hesitation he said i'm looking back meaning he wants to protect that third place slot i have the feeling now if not at the beginning of today definitely by the end of today Remco is looking forward and Jonas, who's been saying, I'm here to win. This race is not over. Maybe now is starting to look backwards. I hope everybody followed me on

that. He has to, uh, JB, he has to, he has no choice. Um, listen, he still has two minutes on Remco. Okay. So in theory, it should be enough, but you know, you never know. Remco is going to have a huge morale now. He did drop Jonas Wingergaard today. He did drop the winner of the last two Tour de France. That's not, that's not anybody that's not given to anybody.

You know, even if Jonas is, I mean, he starts to feel the fatigue but uh but Remco's gonna have that in mind and and Jonas uh I I think he has to be realistic and see and then in Visma also that it's better to defend the second place because I mean you could also say you know it doesn't really matter you know he's one to two could also say, you know, it doesn't really matter. He's won the two or twice, whether he's second or third, it doesn't really matter

as long as we try. But I fear it's not going to work with Pogacar. He's basically untouchable at this moment. So we have an interesting battle on our hands there. Still three very hard stages

to come. The last day is a time trial uh you could say okay advantage ramco but it's it's basically a mountain time trial there's two climbs and then it's flat and downhill so i think they're they're more or less even there but the ramp was gonna have huge morale that's what i i was thinking too, and he's climbing better than we've ever seen him. Yes. In his life. I saw a picture of Remco and Bogacar after the finish.

They were sitting next to each other. Remco is incredibly skinny. He is so skinny compared to what we're used to that, I mean, obviously with that, with, with, with all the elevation there's still to come, it's a huge advantage. That would be a wild story. And I, I feel like I have to be careful.

Yeah. And let me ask you this because you do a lot with the Danish press. I look at the comments, they get, they get very upset if we don't pick Jonas. Yeah, they do. They're very sensitive. I appreciate you guys listening. I love you. I don't have a favorite in this fight. I really don't.

And I don't think any of us do. And it changes day to day. Yeah. But it's a... At the end of the day, JB, you know, we have to be with our feet on the ground and say, listen, if Jonas Vingegaard finishes second in this Tour de France, it is an incredible story.

Thinking where he was two months ago, right? Agreed. That's for starters. But of course, once you're there and once you're, you know, I think everybody got hyped up after this. First of all, after seeing Jonas really responding to Pogacar, not losing too much time, then finally beating him. The sprint, yeah.

Everybody got super excited. But we also have to take into account that Pogacar made a huge mistake that day. He attacked from way too far and he forgot he was not fueled up. You know, he learned from way too far and he forgot he was not fueled up you know it's he learned from that definitely but uh we'll see i mean you know if if you're in the head of jonas vingergaard of course he's gonna say no i'm not here to be second you know i want to win if if not doesn't matter i mean and and that's respectable but when it really comes down to the race situations, he's going to defend that second spot for sure.

Yeah. I mean, for entertainment purposes, if Giannis and Remco are within a minute of each other, you know, somewhere around there going into the time trial, that's pretty exciting. That's going to be a good show. Let's see. And I also have to say, uh, JB, you know, I mean, we've, we've talked about, uh, um, at, in our preview show, we've talked, you know, I had this picture behind me of, of, of, uh, Jonas and today and Primoz and Remco, you know, the big, we said the big four and Lance and I said, well, you know, it's really not the big four. It's the big three and Remco. I the big we said the big four and and Lance and I said well you know it's really

not the big four it's the big three and Remco I mean he's proving now that he belongs in the big four he's actually with the big tree right uh because he was already ahead of primos uh when primos had that problem um so so I think hats off to him, you know, um, he's, he's proving that he's a grand tour rider, uh, to do this in his first tour to France. It's pretty amazing. And he's in a white Jersey. He's in a white Jersey. And, uh, let me tell you, Belgium, Belgium is super excited. Oh, I bet. Cause you've been, you've been very open and candid about how uh difficult it's been for for remco growing up with the belgian press if and they're not okay everyone you said everyone in belgium's getting excited if the potential of him

jumping to second he goes home on the podium oh massive success massive success. Yeah. Yeah. Not just for Belgium, but for him. You know what I mean? I would say, I'd probably say if he finishes third in the Tour,

in terms of his career achievements for the moment, that's probably worth more than his Vuelta win. Hmm. Looking towards the future. You know, because they've said, yeah, you know, you won the Vwin looking towards the future you know because they've said yeah you know you won the welter but you know it's not the high mountains not everybody was there well here everybody's here and if you're third and you're rivaling with the guy who won the two

or twice you're up there yeah it a great perspective for the future. Okay. And I wanted to ask you something, because if you didn't hear the move this morning, you should go listen to it. But I just want to have the conversation with just you, because, you know, Lance gave quite a speech to Pogacar this morning. About how it's political, too. You can't just keep attacking, attacking. And of course, that's what we know that Lance did when it wasn't necessary. And in hindsight, you know, at this point in his life going, yeah, wow, I shouldn't have done that. And we started to get into it a little bit because I knew you probably at some point had to tap him on the shoulder and go, Hey, chill out, chill out.

So give us, let's continue that conversation here a little bit about Pogacar and the politics of being a leader. Yeah. I mean, you know, I understand Lance's position about the politics. I don't think Pogacar is in that same situation. But still, especially in the Tour de France and in France, the French public does not like people who win too many times. They're going to be rooting for Wingergaard or for Remco.

If you win too much, they're going to be rooting for Wingergaard or for Remco. If you win too much, they're going to start to boo you. I'm pretty sure that Tadej has already experienced that, but I don't think he really cares. The guy just loves to race his bike, and you can't blame him. I'm more looking at it from

a performance perspective that you need to manage your effort during three weeks and you know he doesn't need to win another stage it's nice to win another stage but he doesn't need to um well he's won three stages now right yes he's probably gonna win another one uh at least another one um without even going, I mean, just the fact that it's going to be a GC battle and that, you know, he's probably going to be the best in one of those three stages. So I'm looking at more from, okay, you need to reserve yourself when you have to, when you have to conserve.

Like today's attack was absolutely unnecessary. He got two seconds. So what? I mean, it's nothing. I can understand that from a mental aspect, it's probably, you know, today was an important one because he did crack Jonas once again in a moment where he decided to, right?

So that also obviously has an influence, but you need to be careful. Listen, there's still four stages. There's still three very hard stages. It's going to be hot. It's high altitude. Anything can happen. If you're in that situation,

just with that last little sprint at the end would have been enough if needed it didn't even need to do that but apparently he can't when he sees a line he needs to sprint so i know and he can it's great it's great and and you know and remco's motivated to attack now he can just sit back and watch yeah right and just follow those guys and just have a front row seat on a great fight. Yeah. Well, you know,

the, the mountain stages are going to be different, you know, so on stage 19, it's a huge mountain stage with, you know, cold double net and finish on finish on Isola 2000. And then the last stage 20 is super hard.

Also, uh, it's a bit different, but, um, but yeah, I mean, I think,

I think we have a great race on our hands for the podium and also for, for places. Well, but yeah, I mean, I think we have a great race on our hands for the podium and also for places, well, I guess fourth and fifth. And if you look, well, actually, Almeida is fourth. He's only 30 seconds ahead of Mikel Landa. So that could be interesting if Almeida is on, you know, facing duty for today. Landa could potentially pass him. Carlos Rodriguez is just six seconds behind Mikel Landa. And then we have this 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th

who are all within two minutes, which is still also a big battle. Yeah, I mean, we're going to see, I mean, I'm, I want to point out again, uh, JB, you know, we have hardly spoken about him only one time. Derek G Derek G is surprising me hugely. What I was going to ask you, Johan, is who is the best climber in the Peloton right now

at this point after stage 17, who is not in the top GC battle? Is it Derek G? Well, he's top 10. I mean, he's not the best climber. He's more an overall rider. I think the best climber who's not up there is probably Felix Gallo. I mean, he's not the best climber. He's more an overall rider. I think the best climber who's not up there is probably Felix Gall. I mean, last year, especially in the last week, I think Felix Gall was probably the third best climber in the last week behind Jonas and Tadej. Now he's in 11th. We haven't seen him putting his stamp on any of the stages.

Could still come. You know, he's in 11th place. He't seen him putting his stamp on any of the stages. Could still come. You know, he's in 11th place. He's 19 minutes down. Could go in a breakaway, but, you know, it's going to be difficult. But other than that, I mean, everybody's there. You know, Jay Hindley is obviously disappointing a bit. You know, he won the Giro. He was second in the Giro. He's almost an hour down. That's obviously not his level, especially since Primoz has gone. He obviously can ride for himself, but for some reason he's not. And then Enric Mas. Enric Mas is also more than an hour down. He's been top five in the Tour of France already. He's been three times second in the Vuelta. He's a climber who is not at the level that we expect him to be. Okay. Anything else before we jump on to Ventum trivia? I think we covered it.

No, that's it. I mean, just, just, uh, one thing I saw today also, JB is that we saw, uh, a lot of riders who are really, I mean, dead, dead dead dead like like shocked of how hard this stage had been like i saw for example oscar only uh really talented climber on dsm uh saw this interview of him the guy could hardly make one sentence he was dead he He was just completely gone. You know, he said, I don't know what to say, really. He said, I have no words, you know. And then on the other hand, I did see an extremely fresh face of Pogacar on the podium. Huge difference compared to last year. I think we all remember this face after he uh had this this massive time loss

on col de la luz he looked terrible he looked like he looked pale he was completely empty we don't see that this year he looks completely different yeah i think they've gotten past the the stress of this rivalry because when we were seeing him look very stressed out the people were start trying to build this story of tension between him and Jonas prior to that it was always like these are two guys are just happy for each other just happy to be on their bike for the most part and now it's just this this rivalry I mean even if goes on first a few more years it's wonderful it's great for the support it is it is it is it's like you

know you never know who's gonna win you know but after what they've been through I think these two you know we'll be able to handle it it's tough when people build up a rivalry that may or may not be there yeah yeah so we are gonna give away a Ventum NS one road bike on Sunday we're gonna draw a name all of you have been entering each day as we ask a question you can submit every single day and that just increases your chances to win yesterday's question was Matthew Riccatello is a rising star in the pro peloton his dad Jimmy was also an endurance athlete what notable event did he win during his triathlon racing career the answer is the XTERRA off-road world championships they would also accept St. Croix Triathlon if you put that in. Today's question is, what is Egan Bernal's nickname?

Okay. Send that in to ventumracing.com slash the move. Let's do a quick question here. James writes to you, Johan, and says, Matthew Vanderpool is always mentioned on the show as the perfect lead out man but i haven't heard exactly why can you please explain what makes him so much better than his contemporaries is this instincts or is it power thanks so much really enjoying the show this season again that's from yeah yeah he is he is the ideal lead-up man

uh but first of all his i think his his ability to move through the peloton and this this ability to to move forward at the last moment um is something that it's unique i mean listen he's the world champion you know he's he's one of the best riders in the world to have, to have the luxury, to have that guy as your lead up man. It's, it does not get any better than that. Um, ideal lead out man also because of his companionship and his friendship with the guy he's leading out. I mean, they, they get along really well. They're good friends. They, they,

they can say things to each other without speaking words just looking they know each other so well um and then especially that last speed that he has that you know he's not he's not fast enough to to be up there with the three four five best sprinters but he's just behind so whenever he does his lead out which is probably about 200 meters long that puts the sprinters already on the limit so ideally if philipson is on his wheel philipson is already on the limit too but he's on the wheel right so basically vanderpool goes to the side and philipson starts his sprint ideally as close as possible to the finish, but all the others are already on the limit too. So there's not many riders who have the

ability to do that. Uh, the way you want the pool does this. It's his, uh, it's his size too. Also. Yeah. Like when you look, I mean, you can spot him a mile away on the bike, his big shoulders, he's Helps that he's in a white Jersey with the rainbow. That's what I was going to say too. If you're, if you're looking for your lead up man, and you're just glancing, you can spot that all white kit. But yesterday, if you go back to yesterday's podcast, JB, and you know, the picture I put up there of the lead out train, there are two or three pictures. You see Vanderpool

and you cannot see Philipsen in that picture. He's right behind. You cannot see it. And Philipsen is not a small guy. He's a pretty bulky guy too, but you cannot see him. So imagine the draft you get behind Mathieu Van der Poel. Yeah. Good question.

Do you have time for one more real quick? Sure. Okay. I know it's a busy day for you, four shows. Uh, and you may or may not know the answer to this. We'll try. My wife and I were watching the Peloton trying to form a breakaway before we left for work today. And she asked if there has ever been a tour de France where a breakaway never got away for all 21 stages. I don't, I don't know. And thought only Johan might know this.

Thanks for the show. I've been watching on YouTube and really appreciate Johan cycling knowledge and stories. That's from Kelly in San Diego. Yeah. Well, I'm not a hundred percent sure, but,

but I don't think so. I think there's always been breakaways. And it's, it's basically impossible that a breakaway that one breakaway never makes it to the finish. I mean, and it also depends on what you consider a breakaway, right? Because you can have a group of favorites that are, let's just imagine there's 15 riders left, uh, because it's been a hard stage. And then one of the non-favorites all of a sudden attacks in the, in the final and, and

gets solo to the finish. Is that a breakaway or is that right? No, depends what you consider a breakaway, but, but I think there's always been breakaways a few, at least, uh, per Tour de France. Probably more so historically than what we've seen in this year's tour has been a little unusual in that regard right yeah yeah yeah usually before there was more breakaways that's sure okay if you want to send a question in we're running out of time to ask Johan is that we get into deep into the last week but send your

questions to the move at we do team thank you for tuning into the last week, but send your questions to themoveatwedo.team. Thank you for tuning into the show and thank you for all your hard work, Johan. I know you're doing a lot today and we'll talk tomorrow. See you tomorrow.