THEMOVE - Is Jonas Vingegaard Targeting the Giro/Tour Double a Mistake? | THEMOVE+

Episode Date: January 16, 2026

Spencer Martin and Johan Bruyneel break down the week in cycling news, including Jonas Vingegaard's decision to take on the Giro/Tour double in 2026, Wout van Aert's quick recovery from his recent ankle surgery, Matteo Jorgenson's proposed race schedule, and what this means for their Visma team in 2026. They also discuss Jayco-AlUla's tactical disasterclass at the Australian Road Race National Championships and break down some interesting and revealing numbers from the 2025 season. Become a WEDŪ Member Today to Unlock VIP Access & Benefits: https://access.wedu.team AG1: AG1 is offering new subscribers a FREE $76 gift when you sign up. You'll get a Welcome Kit, a bottle of D3K2 AND 5 free travel packs in your first box. So make sure to check out https://www.DrinkAG1.com/themove to get this offer! That's https://DrinkAG1.com/themove to start your new year on a healthier note. Mint Mobile: This year, skip breaking a sweat AND breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your 3-month Unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at https://mintmobile.com/themove. Upfront payment of $45 required (equivalent to $15/mo.) Limited-time new customer offer for the first 3 months only. Speeds may slow above 35GB on Unlimited plan. Taxes & fees extra. See MINT MOBILE for details. Gusto: Try Gusto today at https://gusto.com/THEMOVE, and get three months free when you run your first payroll. Rugiet Ready: Head to https://rugiet.com/THEMOVE and use code THEMOVE to get 15% off today.

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Valentine's Day is February 14th, so don't wait. Get exclusive deals up to 50% off at meandies.com slash comfort. code comfort. That's meundies.com slash comfort code comfort. There's no guarantee that Pogacar is going to have every year a clean run without any issues. You know, look, he crashed last year and it could have been a lot worse. And then you need to be in pole position to win, you know. You don't want to win because somebody else crashes, but, you know, if the big favorite crashes, somebody's going to win. So it might as well be you, no?

I do think Yonis is so much better I'm sorry, Eunice is so much better than everybody else that's not Pogacra that he can do the Giro, win the Gero and still be in position to be best of the rest of the tour. Yeah, I think he's going to be top in the tour after the Giro. Hey everybody, welcome back to the Move Plus.

I'm Spencer Martin. I'm here with Johan Berniel. We are going through. This is our weekly show where we go through the cycling news of the week as well as take a few listening. our questions. The main things we'll talk about today is Vizma, Lisa Bikes, Media Day, which had Jonas Finnegard finally confirming his Giro Detalia, two to France, double ambitions,

Mateo Jorgensen's kind of altered schedule for 2026, and Woutvinart with coming back from that broken ankle, as well as the Australian National Championships breaking down what the heck happened there. Richard Plug's recent comments, as well as some interesting numbers about the year, including the final tally for our 2025 kilometer slash mileage challenge on Strava. But before we get into that, Johan, let's take a quick break to hear from today's partner and then we'll get into it. Everybody, this episode is brought to you by AG1. I'm going to let you in on a little secret about how I start my day.

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Get and get that offer. That's three free AG1 travel packs, three free AGZ travel packs plus a free vitamin D3 plus K2 and AG1. Welcome kit with your first AG1 subscription order. That's drinkag1.com slash the move. Drink AG, the number one.com slash the move. All right, Johan, we've been alluding to this and I kind of assume. it was happening in my mind, but Jonas Vindegard announced at the Costa, the Vizma's, I guess their second Costa Blanca training camp of the year already, or the season,

that he's officially doing the Giro de Taya and Tour de France. I heard some rumors that, oh, that's why Simon Yates retired. He heard Yonis was targeting the Giro, and that put him over the edge. I don't know if this was a surprise to anybody, including Simon Yates. But I like it because I think they should try to win the Gero. It means he'll have won every grand tour. That's pretty impressive. Not many people have done that.

But what were your thoughts on this announcement? Yeah, I think it makes sense, Spencer. I mean, you know, he still needs to win it, of course, right? But I think he is the second best stage racer in the world. There's no doubt about that. And today he's going full gas for the tour. Looks like his main rival for the Giro will probably be Jiao Almeida, if I'm not mistaken. plus some others, but, you know, he already showed that he can beat Joe Almeida.

He did he did the same in the Vuelta. And this was a Jonas who was, in my opinion, not at his best in the Vuelta. He still managed to win it quite dominantly, I would say. So I think it was pretty close. Well, yeah, no, it's close and not close, Spencer. You know, at the end, the last stage, you know, he just rode away from everybody. maybe not in time, but was he ever really in trouble, put in trouble by Almeida? The only guy who actually put Jonas Wingergaard in trouble during the Vuelta of last year was Thomas Pitcock.

He dropped to. Other than that, I don't think Almeida was ever able to really drop. Us at the Almeida fan club would file this piece of evidence with the judge. probably the closest he came to challenging Vindigard. People have been sending me pronunciation guides for Jonas Vindigard. It's not going to get better people. But he put him under a little bit of pressure in the miniature time trial on stage 18. And if that was the link that was supposed to be, maybe it's closer because of that.

That would be what you point to. Yeah. Yeah. But no, I mean, I think, you know, if respect the picking order of the talents in the grant, Jonas is the best if today is not there. So I think it makes a lot of sense for several reasons. First of all, okay, if you have the opportunity to win all three grand tours and you can finish your career saying, hey, I'm one of the very few who have won all three grand tours,

there's not that many. You know, there's there's Eddie Merck's, there's Chris Frum, there's, Bernardino, Miguel Inderain never won all three, for example. What about Finian? Finian won the Giro, won the tour twice. I don't think he won the Vuelta. I don't think so. Yeah, I guess you're right.

I mean, this is according to AI. So there's Contador who won all three. Vincent's Oniabody, one all three. Yep, yep. And then there must be some others. There's only two more. Three Eddie marks, probably. They're very famous, very famous writers would be your hint.

Okay. Stephen Rhodes didn't win all three. He won two. So who is it? Tell me. Jacques Enquatil and Felice. Felice Jamande. Yeah.

So that's not very many riders. Yeah. I mean, you know, so for Jonas to be to be in that circle, that's pretty big. It's no guarantee he's going to win, no. But,

you know, if everything goes to plan, they're sending a strong team. The course is decent. I would say for Jonas. Yeah. I think, I think he's probably going to win the Gero.

If his preparation goes well. And then, you know, combining it with the tour. he's probably not going to race between the Gero and the tour at all. So I think it's doable. It's, I think maybe would it be, I don't know what you think, would it be mentally already giving up a little bit on the dominance of Pugachar saying,

hey, you know, it's highly unlikely I can win the tour unless there's circumstances. So I'm going to go for the Gero and then I'll see what the tour brings. That would be my takeaway from this decision. Maybe, maybe, but unless I'm misremembering, did Ted and Pagachar not go to the Giro and win it while he was not reigning tour champion and then he went to the tour in one when he hadn't won it in two years

so I guess that would prove the opposite that did that Giro give him like a springboard to come off of yeah I don't think it's the same I don't think it's the same I don't think Pugachar was in the same mindset as because man he's been dominating the tour and the whole

season and the whole world of cycling. So it's, you're up against a cannibal, you know. I almost feel like Jonas, should he not, this is totally loser behavior, loser thoughts, but should he not even try to beat him? Just, he's so good. Spencer, you know, I mean, you have to be there. You have to be there and just try. And then, hey, there's always circumstances. There's no guarantee that Pogacar is going to have every year a clean run without any issues. You know, look, he crashed last year and it could have been a lot worse. And then you need to be in pole position to win, you know. You don't want to win because somebody else crashes.

But, you know, if the big favorite crashes, somebody's going to win. So it might as well be you, no? I do think Yonis is so much better. I'm sorry, Eunice is so much better than everybody else that's not Fogacra that he can do the Gero, win the Gero, and still be in position to be best of the rest of the tour. Yeah, I think he's going to be top in the tour after the Gero. I think the science maybe has changed on that. Yeah, sure. I think it's not going to burn them out like maybe we thought it would a few years ago.

It's completely changed. Back in the days, you would for sure say, hey, you know, okay, they'll do the Gero. They're not going to be 100% of the tour. that gets calm. That doesn't exist anymore. But you can also say, look at it in a different way. Like if Jonas goes to the Giro and wins it, you know, he starts the tour with almost no pressure. And everything that happens is fine.

You know, so it's not like you're at the Tour de France and you have to, you know, fulfill your mission to make up your season, to make your season good. You know, if he's won the Giro already, he has that one in the pocket. He can go to the Tour de France more relaxed, see what happens and be ready in case the day has a bad day or there's a problem or whatever. I like it. I think it's a great plan. Yeah. And even just practically, a guy that's remunerated at the level of Jonas has to do two grand tours for that team. Well, especially Spencer because he doesn't race that much often.

Yeah. Part of the other races. Does he want to go back to the Volta again? I mean, that could get a little stale after a while. So I like this. Mix it up. I don't know. Try something else.

You know what? You know what has not worked? Targeting the tour specifically. So I don't know, to try something else. See if it works. Yeah. Yeah. For sure.

And by that, I mean, clearly, it has worked twice, but in the new pagachar. Yeah. Yeah. And so let's say you're the team manager. Jonas is doing Giro. tour double. How do you manage the support team around this? Because you can't just run back the same support team. That's the biggest challenge. You know, so you have these champions like Jonas, like today, like Remko. These are big engines. But the support team around them, there's there's only

two or three who can do both. The others, you have to change them. You have to mix them up. They do have a pretty deep team, I would say. So, you know, I'm not, I'm not. I'm not. I'm not not overly concerned that that they're, I mean, they're going to, standing a strong team to the, to the Gero and also to the tour. I, I think Sepp Kus has already announced, no

that he wants to do both. If not all three again. Seb, don't do it. Don't listen to him, Visma. Yeah. I mean, he's clearly capable of it, but I do feel like that put him in a hole after he did all three. Yeah.

I mean, he'll probably, if he does, I mean, he, I see he's penciled in for the zero here. He'll probably do the tour. And probably will do the Volta. And also Campanarts has already announced that he does Jero and tour and forgets about classics or any personal ambition whatsoever. So that's, that's definitely a good guy to have around. And they've signed two Zerretaxia specialist from small Italian team. So there you go. Slot those guys.

Yeah. Elizari and Paganzoli? Yeah. No, no, not Belizari. Wurli and Fiorini. It's, yeah. It's Fiorrelli, I believe. Fiori, right?

Whatever. Fiorrelli, Fiorini. Whatever. I heard they signed him. I heard they signed him because now I could be confusing my time. It's either Pigginsoli or Fiorrelli because they did a data analysis and he crashes less than anyone else in the Peloton. which I don't know how you would get that data.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if that's a good step to sign somebody, though. Yeah, trust me. I know where to ride were not to crash. It's called off the back. Exactly. You're not going to crash back there.

You're never in the mix. That's a good point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because you often crash because you're putting yourself in a position to win or to make a difference. But we like it. Yeah, I do hear your concern that is it giving up before the race happens.

I don't know if that's going to make. I think we're in an era where you might as well try anything because whatever you probably isn't going to make that much of a difference. Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. And another thing that came out of this. Also, he announced his program, Spencer. What do you think? So the big highlights are Arden's class, the focus is Arden's classics, Tour de France,

and then presumably world championships Lombardia later in the year. But no cobbled classics, no Perrinis. I like it. I like it. I mean, because Perry Nees, he's won twice in a row. What's he going to do? He's going to go back.

The options are win a third, maybe. But does that, is that accomplishing his goals as a writer? Or he doesn't win? You know, like, what's left to mine there for him? I think, I think it's a good decision to not go to Parinise, try something else. And I think it also says something about the ambitions, the realistic ambitions of Visma in the Tour de France.

You know, they're going with two leaders. They're going with Jonas and Matteo. Matteo is not just a guy who has his goals early on and then is there as a support rider in the tour. He will have his own chance and it's a different approach. And it could work, you know. I mean, if you have Matteo Jorgensen, who's, you know, in theory, a top five contender, I would say, if he's, you know, if he's fit and has no problems, injuries or crashes or illness, you could use that tactically and put, put UAE under pressure, you know, by being aggressive. Okay, it looks nice on paper.

It's, you know, on the other hand, if UAE. is the way they have been and there's no reason to think they won't be, then it doesn't really matter that much. You know, if Jorgensen is a top five threat, you always have to think, okay, is he really a threat for Pogacar, though? My answer is no. He is a threat, however, for other candidates for the podium or top five. And then these guys will actually help you to bring

him back whenever he's going in a breakaway and tries to put the race under pressure. I also really like the idea of him focusing on Amstel Gold and Liege best on liege in the spring. I think he could win Amstel gold. And if Pagatja has a problem, maybe liege. It's basically Spencer. It's the whole year. Anybody can win the races where Pogacar is if Pogacca has a problem. otherwise.

I mean, that's where we're at. It's freaky. It's a weird, it's a weird thought process to go through. He had quotes that he thought the longer climbs of the Ardennes would suit him better than the cobbles. At first,

I was surprised by that because he's done pretty well in the Cobble classics. The top five finish it. Flanders, he won dwarves, Dwar's Dwar Vlandering, not just dwarves, because that would just mean across. But he's always had success.

But I do, I do kind of agree with them. I'm like, well, if we're talking about him, him as a grand tour, a tour to France top five finisher, he would stand a reason liege best on liaise would be a good race for sure. For sure. No, those races fit him perfectly. There's no doubt about it. Maybe, maybe to a lesser extent, flesh will own because that's steep and explosive.

So I think Matteo is different. I mean, he will be okay. He will be in the front. But, you know, there's probably going to be riders who have a bit more of a punch on that last climb. But, you know, he's still going to be up there top five. But Liash is a great race for Matteo Jorgensen, I think. Yeah, I think it's a really good race. I like this program. They're mixing it up. They're not just going back to the same thing.

I think that's important. Obviously, as you say for the tour, him being as good as possible, the tour is key for Vizma, especially with Simon Yates out. Like, this can be very important. You might ask, well, who's doing the Kabul classics for Vizma?

We'll talk about Valvan Art next in a second. He's actually doing pretty well. But Matthew Brennan, the very young British writer who had a great season last year, he's doing San Remo and then the full cobbled classics lineup with Tour of Flanders and Perry Rubet being the big headline of that. And then he's going away to prepare for the tour of Switzerland. So Brennan's their cobbled guy alongside Van Ard, it looks like. Yeah. Yeah, I think Brennan is ready to step up, you know, after the amazing season he had. In 2025, he's shown where he's, I mean, I looked at his program, and there's a lot of races.

He did like, all one day races, all one day races, which, you know, he's, he's incredibly strong. So we'll see how he does now in a more, I would say, more protected role. I think 2025 was more of a discovery season, you know, to see where he could get. But now he's, I think he's ready to have responsibility in the team and to have a protected role. So I think he's going to be great. Yeah, I agree. And then let's take a quick break. And then we'll talk about Wap and Art, how he fits into this Visma plan, his recovery,

which is going a little bit better than I thought it would when we come back. Everybody, this episode is brought to by Gusto. So quick business confession, there was a stretch of time. We're running payroll and handling the paperwork of running a small business ate up my entire afternoons. I'd sit down to do one simple admin task. And suddenly it was two hours later, I was varying in forums and I was not watching or writing about professional cycling. It was a disaster. But everything changed when I moved over to Gusto.

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month plan required, taxes and fees extra initial plan term only over 50 gigs. data may slow when the network is busy. Capable device is required. Availability, speed, and coverage varies. CementMobil.com for more details. All right, Yohan, last time we talked, we were a little worried about Wadvonar. Broke his ankle, like third day of the year.

Not a great way to start the year. He's done. Cyclercross season, done. We were thinking, wow, that's really not good for his road season. Because even if everything went perfect for him, it's still not easy out there. As we're talking about, everyone's going up

against Pagachar. there's also Matthew Vanderpull in the races. Whatopenerd likes to win. Things were not looking great. Well, a week goes by. He has a week off the bike. Well, he has ankle surgery first. They put pins in there.

Has a week off the bike? So let's let's have a look at the pictures here, Spencer. So we have, first of all, the crash, which where you can see basically where, you know, the ankle is completely bent so that looks bad. Then you have this picture that Walt posted on his social media of his swollen ankle straight after the finish in the camper. or in the bus and then the surgery itself this you know there's one screw um it's uh it's a it's a clean break and a clean surgery also so to me it looks like it's it's the it's a minimal

impact it's broken yes but it's together it's fixed together the fact that you know he's started riding again so quickly uh i think he still has to i mean no i don't think i'm sure he has to pay attention. He walks with a boot, you know, with a protection boot, but you could see him walk on the podium at the media day without crutches. So that's already something. And this was, I think the media day was basically nine days after the crash. So I'm quite impressed, actually, with how fast he's back up on his feet, literally.

And yeah, we were kind of ringing the alarm bell a little bit last week, but I think right now I'm more optimistic. And especially Spencer, after hearing his interviews with the Belgian media, he sounds extremely confident. There's no doubt in his mind that he's going to be full ready for the classics. So he must feel, okay, he actually said, that where he feels the best is on the bike. The biggest challenge for him is getting his cycling shoe on his foot.

Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Which, it's good. It's good he's not racing. Are we sure he's not going to jump in the Bididem World Cup? He's just staying right up the road in La Nusia.

He can't run. He can't run. But I think this is. That would be madness. I mean, he would not be. I would stop it. I would fly over. there and tackle them before he could start.

But he's already logging massive rides with teammates on the Costa Blanca. So this is not as bad as we thought. Still obviously a big ask to win these big races against the best riders in the world at the peak of their powers. But it means Visima will probably he'll be available and they will have, along with Matthew Brennan, a really good squad for these races. Yeah. Now, if you look, Spencer, like yesterday.

So yesterday was, what was 11 days, 12 days after the conference. crash, right? So let's say 11 days after the surgery. He is, and this was not his first ride, by the way. He did a ride in Belgium, then he did one ride in Spain, and this is his second ride in Spain. So his third day on the bike. And then that's not counting the days he was on the home trainer, probably. So he did 144 kilometers yesterday, 2,800, almost 3,000 meters of elevation during the ride, so not an easy ride. At a decent speed, 31.4 kilometers average. I even see that he broke some personal records on that route.

I'm tempted to think that he has been there many times before already in that area. So, you know, I see one, two, three, four, five personal records. So it was not a coffee ride, you know. So I think he's fine. I mean, I'm relieved, actually. I was worried last week, but I'm relieved now, especially because the demeanor in his interviews and the way he sounded. He looks and sounded quite optimistic. I thought you're going to say you feel good because he broke my PR to the climb to Finistrat by a full two minutes.

Oh, wow. He might be winning the tour this year. unbelievable. But I mean, these are big rides to be doing. We need to check how many times well, Von Ard went up Finistrat.

That's, yes, on that ride. No, in total. In total. It may be his first time. Well,

if it says PR on there, it probably means you've been, I think you have to do at least two. Well, but how many times has he done it? Yeah, that's true. And uploaded it to Strava, you know?

Let's just check. I'm just going to quickly check. So let's see. Von Art here where he is. Here he is. So let's see his ride from yesterday. Oh, he wrote today. He just uploaded today. Let's see what he did today. 184 kilometers, 3,300 meters of elevation. He's essentially missing nothing here. Yeah. This is full preparation. So he says 184 kilometers, 3,300 meters, smooth ride. I mean, this is great to see.

Like he's... This is life. This is just, this just came in now. So, you know, so I think, I think he's fine, man. Yeah. And then the other kind of interesting thing about this is Matthew Vanderpull, skipping the Benadorm World Cup, which is notable because it's close to where he lives. And he seems to be unable to lose any cyclic cross races because he's focusing on road training.

He's doing a road training. camp. So are these guys finally, this is the maturity era of their careers where they're like, maybe I don't race a bunch of things that are not road cycling and I focus on one day classics because that seems to be what Tadipagacra and Matt's Pedersen are doing. Yeah, I think, I think, I think it's also a matter for Mathieu van der Poul. I think it's also a matter of finding the balance now between, you know, he's definitely in great shape, right? He wants to minimize the risks. He already crashed once in Benidorm when he hit he hit the post like a light post I don't have remembered this with his shoulder so so yeah I mean I'm not I'm not

reading anything into it other than you know he's in Spain now he wants to just you know he wants to get some miles and he knows that is his form is good he knows he's dominant in the cyclocross field and yeah I just Spencer just to I mean just to lower your enthusiasm a little bit about your time on Finestrade. Well, Benard didn't stop to make a cappuccino. What was Walt's time again? I think he was 1114 or something. Okay, so it's this is, I don't think this, this must probably have been his first,

his first time. You know, Finestra is not a climb that people, tend to do a lot for PR. Well, it's right when you start, you know. They're rolling out of the hotel and then you go out. But now has the, I mean, at least the best time of the people I'm following, 927. 927. The fastest guy I follow is Valverde eight minutes.

Okay. So look, so I have 1027 here, Fondrupul. And then I have actually a friend of mine who is, I would say probably close to 60, 57-58, Ricardo Arroyo, a friend of mine, who writes a lot, 1053. So, whoo. That's smoking. Holy smokes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's faster than Remcoevenepool. Is he a former pro? Is he a former pro? It's pretty impressive. Just a regular guy? Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, regular guy. I mean, yeah, I mean, he has a job.

He's, yeah, he's in his late 50s. But he rides along. He's fit. He's super fit. I think he does. I think he has like 10 or 12 or 15. Like these there's these races, these races in a mountain bike in the desert, Titan Desert, the Titan Desert.

Yeah. He's like he's, yeah. So, so yeah, I mean, I just see him here. Ricardo. He's up here. 1053. Congrats, Ricardo. That's pretty impressive.

That does deserve a shout out. That's, that's, it's, man. Wow. I can't wait to be that fit. I can't wait until I get older and I'm not fit. And, and Spencer, the most impressive is, where most impressive is, let me just first see if it's him. Yeah. He did it in October of last year.

So not like three, four years ago. He did it now. That's pretty impressive. We'll have, the authorities are going to be visiting him for just the sample. But let's take another quick break, and then we'll talk about the Australian National Championships. The moment I watched this, I thought I can't wait to ask you on about this. Hey, everybody, this episode is brought to by Ruggiat. Here's something most doctors know that most men never talk about.

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off at meundies.com slash comfort, code comfort. That's meundies.com slash comfort code comfort. Okay, Johan, Australian National Rotary's Championships, this was last weekend. It's always a bit confusing trying to figure out what day it is in Australia, but I was watching this on Sunday. This must have happened in Sunday in Australia as well. Defending champion, Luke Durbridge, off the front, on J. Coelula. Pretty sizable gap inside the last 15K, thinking, well, okay, he's going to double up. Behind Luke Plab on Jailula, he's in a group. I feel like he was the one pushing the pace that kind of created a split with,

and I frankly had never heard of this team. It's Team Brennan, it's a Continental. So third division pro team, which you're dipping into the Amidemi, level when you're in the third division a professional. He was on picnic post in the last year. Patrick Eddy, and there's multiple riders from his team. So this is super impressive from the team.

In this group, this chase group with Luke Plap, they have, I was watch, I was like babysitting, watching it and the neighbor kids were like, it's double because it was Jacob Brennan. And then the chasers were Jacob Brennan. They connect. They're still behind Durbridge. They're getting close to the finish.

It is a hard finish. Luke Plap says, I'm just going to accelerate here, ride everybody off my wheel, reel in my teammate, who he did gift the win to last year. So he kind of owed him one. Reel in my teammate,

drop everybody win. Well, that's not what happened. He reeled in Durbridge. Patrick Eddy, smart man, just huddled on that wheel. And Spelon fast time. Yeah.

Knowing, you know, you know, when you know, all you have to do is hold a wheel to win, you can hold it. he holds it and then out sprints plapp for the win the thing the only thing that really saves plat from total embarrassment is uh jaco did not get third decathlon got third because there was a chase group coming behind what were your thoughts on this joan i i thought yeah i was i thought this was one of the weirdest finishes to a pro race i've ever seen one of the most stupid

tactics you can think of you know i mean it's like it's it's you know tactics 101 you know you have a teammate in front, even if, I mean, and you could say, well, you know, Dürberg was probably not going to make it, right? Yeah, but he was fading at the end. He was dying. He was dying, you know, but, but still, you know, you are not the one to instigate that chase unless you are absolutely sure you're going to blow everybody off your wheel. But that, that didn't happen.

So I don't know. if it's a team tactics, it's extremely stupid. I'm tempted to think that it's not the team, but it's an individual decision of Luke Plap, which in this case, he is stupid because, you know, that's not the way you win at a bike race. You know, I mean, Luke Plap, he's an incredibly strong rider, right? There's no question about that.

He comes from he has a track background. He has a huge potential, huge power when he has his name. Huge engine. He can win many, many, I mean, many kinds of stages, different kind of stages, time trials, even mountain stages. But, you know, there's a reason why Luke Blab, who is so strong and so talented, has almost never won a road race except the national championships. I think if I'm not mistaken, Spencer, he's won two races in his career outside of Australia, which is a stage in the Giro where he was unbelievably strong, blew everybody away.

Just dropped everybody. And then one stage in a stage race in Greece, the tour of Hellas, I think. Yeah. You know, a rider like with that quality has to win a lot more races, you know, and he didn't. So there's a reason for that. I mean, I think back, I don't know if it's because, I mean, obviously, Tactically, he cannot be very smart. Otherwise, you don't do this.

But I also have the impression that Luke Blab is a different rider. If he races in Australia, it's pretty straightforward, I would say. You know, you're strong, you're in the front. Then basically at the end, if you're really strong, you blow everybody off. This time he couldn't. Off your wheel. In Europe, I have seen him struggling a lot with positioning. a lot, a lot.

I do remember he took the yellow jersey in Paris Nice. He was the leader of Paris Nice. And it was a stage where you could see it was difficult and up and down turning. He was in the last five positions of the pelatom. And are you doing that? You don't do that because you want to be there. You just are there because you're not great in the bunch. And I think anyways, this observation doesn't change.

justify the tactics used by Luke Plop in the Australian Championships. It made me think, I mean, it's actually almost a copy of, you know, there's a race I have from my, from my childhood. When I started racing, I remember I watched the race, the world championships then in 1982. I just started racing. I was cadet, I think. But it's still in my memory. And it stuck with me, you know, it was the world championships.

in 1982 in Goodwood in the UK, there was a select group and there was Jonathan Boyer was an American professional cyclist. I think he's the first American professional who did the Tour de France, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, I believe so. He was off the front by himself and then you have a select group of all the favorites.

The big favorite was Giuseppe Saroni. He was the, you know, very big favorite, especially with that kind of finish. And you have Greg Lamont, initiating the chase attacking from the bunch after his again also dying teammate because Jonathan Boyer would not have won but you know by the mean then and then basically Saroni just flew by everybody and you know made it look like it was a junior race it was quite similar to those kind of tactics you know so I mean normally that's

something you don't do you know if you have a teammate in front even if you see he's going to be reeled in, you wait for your opportunity and you actually use that to your advantage to initiate a move and just take advantage of it. Even if you're selfish and you don't, I don't like my teammate. I want to win, not them. You still should do what Johan's saying because it plays to your advantage. You should never close down a gap to your teammate because just you, that's a luxury you have in that moment. Like if Plap is on Eddie's wheel and tells Eddie like, hey, go go close that wheel, Eddie has to close the final bit to Durbridge and then that perhaps gives Plap the launch pad to then attack and drop Eddie before the sprint.

If you're doing, like, we just watched that, LeMond, that world championships right before we did this and, you know, maybe, maybe nobody stops. That was an unbelievable acceleration. But when you close the gap like that, you're just giving a launch pad to someone else. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you could say LeMont did it and finally he secured his second place because he's, he kind of anticipated.

Yeah. It was a bit of head, but, you know, I mean, listen, Saroni would have won no matter what. Yeah. It was a good. Yeah. And the, the team tactics on this, a lot of hand-wringing about this,

I will say it's always weird for the dominant team of a country when you're at a national championships. It's always strange because you have the numbers, you have the best riders, because clearly, like if you're the biggest team, in the country. You're just going to sign all the best riders in that country. But they also want to win. You don't, you're not really working as a team. It's, it's kind of like the Dutch

situation at the women's gravel world championships. It's like, oh, can you believe they close down their own rider? It's like, well, they're half the field. So yeah, there's going to be some competition from the team. Yeah. But in this case, I think, you know, if you're Jake or Alula, you know, your main, your primary mission is, okay, nobody can win this jersey except one of us. That's the primary mission. Do they have radios in these races? I don't think so. I don't think in the national championships that's allowed, you know?

To me, it looked like a guy that relies a lot on the radio and then didn't have a radio. Yeah. And that, yeah, that's probably also a reason. But still, listen, I think juniors would know how to race if this is the case. Yeah, if that wasn't a junior race. I just think he felt like he was super strong and he would drop everybody and that didn't happen. And we like, how does this feel for Patrick Eddy? The guy got, he gets flicked from his world to her team.

He's back in Australia. We don't know exactly the reason, right? I mean, yeah. Like from a team, okay. I don't know if there's promises being made. If, you know, going off his results, you know, there was not much there to say, hey, you know what? I deserve my spot on this team.

So, but anyway, maybe. there were conversations held, promises made, and then ultimately his contract was not renewed. I mean, I personally, listen, I mean, with all due respect, I did not. I have seen his name a few times last year, but I was always wondering, huh, who's this? Patrick Eddy, never heard of him. Yeah, I'm not going to put picnic on blast here and say, I saw this coming. Eddie, he's one of the big sprinting talents in the Peloton. I frankly don't even, I don't think I could have picked him out of a lot of.

lineup before this. In his interview, I heard that his last win was Junior's Nationals. Wow. So, yeah. But he's only 20. He's only 23. Yeah, yeah.

He's young. So, I mean, I'm pretty sure. I don't know. Is he going to get picked up by a team? Probably. It's probably one of those riders that didn't, you know, come to the attention of a lot of team managers. now he's doing two down under with that team or with the, is it with that team or with the national team?

I don't know. I bet it's with the national. Yeah. Yeah, with the national. Yeah. Yeah. So big, big race for him. So yeah, I mean, he's going to try to.

I mean, obviously he's going to show himself because he's going to wear the national. I mean, yeah, if he rides in the national team, it's not going to be much difference with the jersey, though, no? Yeah. But. It always looks like a team of Australian national champions. I think a team will be interested in him to give him another chance. So, yeah, I'm curious to see what happens there. I still can't believe.

But Durb, not Durbridge, Plap, just to illustrate what something I noticed from him. I think it was Milan Center, M.O. 2024. And, you know, when they get on the coast and there's these climbs, positioning is everything. He's sitting last wheel going into every climb and then getting dropped because the position. and then closing the gap in between the climbs. And like it's so, it's a so hard to do that. It's super hard.

No one in their right mind would do that. The guy is really, really super strong. I mean, there's no question about that. And it's just as positioning, I know, awareness is what you would call it in American sports.

Just is not, and it's unclear to me is that the team must be hammering this home and it's just not totally connecting in every way. But moving on, Richard Pluga, Visima Lisa Bike, team managers slash, I guess, partial owner, had a recent, if you cast our minds back a year, we were talking about one cycling. Richard Pluga was one of the team managers heading this up.

This was a breakaway league revolutionizing the business of pro cycling. Now he's saying, well, the UCI has to come in and create some guardrails because teams, I don't know if he said it exactly like this, but team budgets are getting too big. The arms race is too intense that we're going to put ourselves out of business if we keep doing this. The UCI has to do something. If he's making an appeal to the UCI,

that tells us one cycling is not happening. Correct? Am I correct in thinking of? Well, could it be a strategic interview also? Could be. I mean, it's a smart guy. You know, and you know what? He's definitely not in this.

alone, you know, obviously he has a voice. I don't think one cycling is that, or at least a form of that initiative. I've read somewhere, I mean, in that same interview, they made the observation that both Ivan Glasenberg, who's the owner of Q306.5, Pinarello, the team, and many other things. and is Deng Bakala, who's been the owner, the majority owner of QuickStep and Sudal team and many other businesses you have. They're two very wealthy people and they're probably joining forces with other similar of their peers, that they are still driving this initiative or under another name. I don't know what it is.

I don't think it's that. and I think at some point it will happen. What I do know for sure, Spencer, is Richard Plugga requests the UCI to take initiative and make moves to change the business model of cycling. I can guarantee you that's not going to happen. That is never going to happen. That's not in the interest of the UCI. UCI wants weak members.

They know who the strong parties are. It's ASO and RCS a little bit. It's definitely not the teams. And they want it to stay like that. They want one strong or two strong partners that they get along with. And the rest is weak and poor. I mean, so to speak, right? So his request to the UCI, Richard, not going to happen.

And he knows that. Yeah, and that's what's very well. He knows that. He knows 100% is not going to come from. them. So I'm thinking, is there something else behind this interview that we don't get or can I can't grasp? I'm kind of tempted to think that's the case. I thought the same thing because he knows it. And then why is he saying it? The strong partner would be ASO, the very strong partner, record profits. These guys are crushing it. Owner of the Tour de France. Did you know something?

And Tourin' Outender is coming up on January 20th. That's crazy to me. We're about it, our first world to a race. You can watch that in the U.S. on Peacock. And every year I put out a guide, a streaming guide, how to watch professional cycling in the U.S. It's the most popular thing I do all year. People are hitting me up. Where is it? Where is it?

Well, guess what? RCS does not have a TV deal in the U.S. for 2026. And like, we're in 2026 right now. So that shows you, I don't know what that means, how that is resolved. But that could be one of their strong partners. is maybe not going to be so strong in the near future. Yeah. Yeah.

But that I could not believe that because it's harder than you think to find this information. Like where will the races be aired? And currently this year to Italia is not set to be aired in the United States. Presumably that will get resolved at some point. But I was surprised. But the Giro's always been separate. You know, they've always been, and they've always been late with everything.

You know, so even the start last year. They didn't know where it was going to be. Yeah, we'll tell you like a week out. Yes, you'll be fine. So I'm calling this numbers corner. We are two, one of them is like super interesting and relates to professional cycling. The other one relates to us. Let's do that first.

Let's talk about ourselves. We had a mileage slash kilometer challenge on Strava in 2025. The final results, we're just trying to see who could ride the most. in most in terms of distance. If it was time, Johan would have crushed me. Johan, this is your final public tally,

and we'll get to your private count in a second. You had 12,636 kilometers, just if you go look at your Strava. I had 12,501 kilometers, so I was 135 kilometers short. I could have spent all new New Year's Day racking that up. I didn't because you had private rides

that must have been marked private, so your private number was higher. I did consider like wanting to so confusion in this. You know what? I've tried to, I've tried to check which for which reason I put one or two rides private. I didn't find them. My total, my real total is 12,804 kilometers. I don't know, man.

Maybe I put, I don't know, one or two rides private because I was embarrassed that they were too slow or something like that. That could be really, I don't know. It's just circling the UCA headquarters. Yeah, or maybe I was somewhere that it was probably better than nobody knew I was there. That's also a possibility. That happens. It happens. And I mean, I knew that you had these extra numbers and I didn't want to do 300K on New Year's Eve.

That was not something I wanted to do. But I was surprised it was that close. And then for 2026, we've added, we have another person with us, Watt Van Hart. So, okay. These are miles. 351 miles. You're 35015. Wow, does a 300 even? So actually, no, he actually made me surpassed us. Yeah, it's just uploaded a ride. Are we doing this again, Spencer, this year? Are we doing

this again? Well, we never really say we are and then we end up doing it. So I mean, the thing is, I think, I think without knowing from each other or without trying to be. I know, if we kind of write more or less the same amount. I know. This is pretty crazy actually. And the elevation is almost exactly the same. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. The pro move would have been to rest on New Year's Eve. Like, I'm not even going to catch them and then drop a 400 kilometer bomb on New Year's Day or something. I get a huge lead.

But the second number I wanted to share with people. So this is the time of year we're listening to a lot of interviews. You go to these media days. Oh, this is what I want to do. And especially when we get to the grant tours, you're going to hear this a lot. I'm not targeting the overall. I'm targeting stages, plural. It's like what everybody says.

I started to wonder, well, okay, everybody says this. How hard is it to win a stage? Because it seems pretty hard, you know? There's not a lot of stage winners out there. So there was 61 stages total in 2025 or 61 stage winners because there was two stages without a winner at the VALTA. Do you know how many winners there are? Like how many riders won a stage of a grand tour?

Huh. Um, 40. Oh, exactly 40. 40. That's impressive. 40 on the door. Now, listen, I mean, you have full disclosure,

we have talked about this before. So that's good. No, we had a wild guess. A wild guess. That's good. I mean, that's not,

that's not many riders. And you know how we talked about this before. How many riders won multiple stages? It's just 12. Wow. So, no, it's like I said, Spencer,

you know, when, when winning a stage in a round tour is and has always been extremely difficult. It's, it is, it is extremely, extremely contested.

And, especially a stage in the tour. It's like winning a stage in the tour is career changing for many, for many riders. I remember when I, I won my first stage in the tour in 93 and it was like, I had the feeling that was like, it could not get any better than this.

I had the maximum. You know, it's like, wow, I won a fucking stage in the tour, man. It's like, this is it. I made it, you know? And, and yeah, it always makes me smile when I see teams or certain writers say, yeah, you know, we're not going to go for GC this year. We're going to go for stages. You know, stages.

Stages. Try to win one first, right? Because most of the guys who say we're not going for GC, we're going to go for stages, usually never will end up winning a stage. they usually don't even get in a breakaway people on the rest of my hearty as they're getting these breaks but do you know which rider

won the most percentage of every stage on offer so like the largest wind share of the entire Peloton that must be today no that's what you would think today Bogotcha did win 6.6 percentage of all stages on offer in Grand Tours

Mads Pedersen won 8.2% of the Grand Tour stages this year yeah Mads Pedersen sneaky he good. So he won so he must have won multiple in the Giro and multiple in the Vuelta then. Yeah, he

won three. I think he won four stages in the in the Giro. Yeah, yeah. And he won in the Valta. Yeah. And he always actually went quite a few, he won, what, a couple of years, he won multiple stages of the VELTA. I think he won didn't he win two stages in the VELTA this year? I recall that, but I'm just seeing one when I look at it. I think we're confused.

I think he won. He always wins one. Anyway, it's five stages out of 61. That's like eight something percent. Yeah. It's really, yeah. People underestimate how hard it is to win. Just 12 riders won multiple stages.

Yeah, because today, this year, only won four stages, no? Only in the tour. Yeah. Just one four. Yeah. Total failure of a season. Yeah. Let's see.

That's how people were talking about it during the tour. What a disappointment. He only won four stages in the overall. Oh, my God. Get this guy. Get this guy out of here. Well, Johan, we all have places to go. I was insulted by our producer about my physical fitness.

So I do have to run to the gym. So I'm ready for July for our grappling. But we were also talking about, you were telling me your friends in Spain, they're like, yeah, they're like really fit. And I'm like, yeah, I guess like at a certain point, maybe we do need to do something other than riding bikes, even though riding bikes is fun. So you're going to the gym. Okay. That's, yeah, that's good. Going to the gym, trying to get in shape. Okay. Trying to turn things around. So I can win stages at the Tour de France this summer. We'll see.

But. All right. And so thanks. We'll be back. And what's crazy is. But the next time we're back, when we're back next week, we will be talking about World Tour bike races. I can't wrap my head around that. Yeah. Time flies, man. All right, it does fly,

especially when the pro cycling season is 10 months out of the year. Well, thank you so much, Johan, and we'll talk soon. Okay, bye. Bye.