THEMOVE - Tour of Flanders 2025 Breakdown live from Mellow Johnny's Bike Shop | THEMOVE

Episode Date: April 6, 2025

Lance, George, and Bradley, coming live from Mellow Johnny's in Austin, Texas, break down Tadej Pogačar's jaw-dropping ride to win the 2025 edition of the Tour of Flanders, which saw him ride clear of a truly elite group of one-day Galácticos to take his second career Flanders title, all in just three career starts. The crew discusses the key moments of the race, what this performance says about Pogačar's place in the sport's history, and how riders like Mathieu van der Poel, Wout van Aert, Mads Pedersen, and Filippo Ganna can hope to challenge him next week over the cobblestones at Paris-Roubaix. Ventum: Check out their wide range of road, gravel, tri and electric bikes at https://ventumracing.com    Roka: THEMOVE listeners get 20% off. Go to https://ROKA.com and enter the code THEMOVE for 20% off any style, including the newly launched San Remo Air.   Ketone-IQ: No sugar. No artificial ingredients—just pure ketones in a convenient bottle. Save 30% OFF your subscription order. Go to https://ketone.com/themove to get yours!   Helix Sleep: Go to https://helixsleep.com/themove for 20% off.   OneSkin: OneSkin is the world's first skin longevity company. By focusing on the cellular aspects of aging, OneSkin keeps your skin looking and acting younger for longer. Get started today with 15% off using code THEMOVE at https://oneskin.co.

This is the greatest cyclist of all time. I mean, what he what he is doing, wherever whenever they put the numbers on his back, he's there, right. And I mean, he's again for a rider of of his style. He's now one two out of three tour Flanders. He's seemingly limitless. All right, everybody, welcome back to the move podcast talking about the 2025 Tour Flanders spoiler alert. The result is very similar to what we talk about all the time.

We are actually sitting here in front of a live audience in Austin, Texas. Thank you. Yeah, yeah, we do. Ah. Right here at MeloJohnny's, at our new-ish location. If you've all been to Austin and been to MeloJohnny's before, you're probably used to the old location. We've now moved not far away, just a matter of blocks. And of course, right out the doors is the Captain K that's going on.

I think thousands of runners, so it was a little bit of a hassle to get down here. But anyways, I'm Lance Armstrong. To my left, joined by Sir Bradley Wiggins. Bradley, thank you for being here. Thank you. Yeah. And over to his left, Mr. George Encapy, the man who actually is better suited to talk about the Tour of Flanders than we are.

But what a hell of a day. Tadej Pogacar just, I mean, honestly, every time I get asked about him so much and we talk about him so much on this show, you just kind of, you just shake your head in disbelief. I mean, he's just that good. And he is just that special. And we can even spend, I think, part of this show

talking about what we expect next week, right? For a rider of his caliber, and especially his size, to take on the Tour of Flanders. I have done the race 17 times, but I didn't know this up until this morning. Subtle facts. Subtle, subtle, subtle fact, a little unknown fact, maybe you guys know, I didn't.

Bradley Wiggins grew up in Belgium, speaks fluent Flemish, and he knows all the climbs. I mean, he was rattling around today, perhaps a lot better than I do. So I had no idea. Yeah, but I mean, aside from doing what I did on the bike, had I not done that, I was still a pervert of the sport. You know, I was fanatical about it. And my first Tour of Flanders I watched was 1994 when Buenio Schmil, Ballerini, Mousseau, in that breakaway,

you rode it 22nd in 2010. I don't remember. My dream was to win Tour of Flanders one day and it never happened because I wasn't suited to why I missed my years riding the tour. But my best years in Flanders came towards the end of my career. What was your best place? I was 20th in 2014, and I was 20th in 2003. So I had that gap in between. Yeah, yeah, okay.

All right, we're gonna get into all the action. Before we do today's show, we're brought to you by Ventum. You can see right here in front of us, for those that are here. That is actually my new Ventum GS1. I love this thing. Rode it on the ride yesterday. Of course, the conditions probably

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And I naturally got the question about Tadej Pogacar, as well as Primoz Roglic. And I told the crowd there, which I'll say today, I just think we have to all agree, and I don't see who would disagree, that this is the greatest cyclist of all time. I mean, what he is doing, whenever they put the numbers on his back, he's there.

And I mean, again, for a rider of his style, he's now won two out of three Tour of Flanders. He's seemingly limitless. Yeah, and one thing we'll point out before we figure out is we are going to open up the show to our questions. So you guys, if you have any questions on the race or whatever, think of them and ask them towards the end of the show.

But going back, Flanders is my favorite one day race on the calendar. It is the hardest race. It is the most dangerous race. Who here did the ride yesterday? Anybody? Or is there anybody kind of nervous like heading out of town with the rain and wind a bit chilly? Cracks in the road. Cracks in the road. Well, times that by a hundred. And that's the start of the Tour of Flanders. I mean, 200. We only watched the finish when there's a breakaway established and the race is sort of already well on its way. But what a lot of us are missing is those first four hours where it's just fight to make some of this team's only goal is like not to win is like to make the breakaway.

So the first 200K is a race within itself just to get that TV time, just to try to get ahead of the favorites. And the stress that those first 200K brings is really intense. So when you see Pogachar and Van de Poel and these guys, they look kind of calm, but they've gone through hell just to get to that final 60 kilometers, which makes that race so, so special in my opinion. And so, so hard, hardest race in special, in my opinion, and so hard. The hardest race in the world, in my opinion.

Yeah, we've said all oftentimes before it is the perfect blend. When I think of the spring classics, I mean, San Remo is kind of an outlier, but you've got Flanders, Roubaix and Liège. The thing I love about Tour Flanders is it's this melange of Roubaix and Liège, right? You've got the cobbles, you've got the hills. To me, it's this melange of Roubaix and Liège, right? You've got the cobbles, you've got the hills. To me, it's the perfect race. If in hindsight, if I could have picked any race

in the spring to ever win, it would have been the Tour of Flanders way before a Roubaix and a Liège and a San Remo. And of course, for anybody that watched the race, they were blessed with beautiful weather. In our day and age, I don't know, we never had no arm warmers, no rain. There wasn't even a cloud in the sky.

Maybe had some wind. Definitely had wind. This was, in that regard, perhaps a little lucky. But I want to go back to Pogachar. And Bradley, you are, whether we like it or you like it or not, you are our resident historian. I mean, are we seeing something? I mean, I don't feel like I'm getting ahead of myself here.

I think this is, we've got to call him the goat. No, I disagree. OK. I think he's heading that way. Give him another five years, another five years of victories at this level, at this dominance, then he's getting close to something of Eddie Merckx. Let's not forget how good Eddie Merckx was and what he achieved. I mean, Tade now

has equaled Eddie Merckx's Tour of Flanders, you know, he did twice, 69 and 75, but he's had less chances at it. And of course, he's only, what is it, 27 now, 26? Yeah, 26. But, you know, give him another five years, he will rival, if not surpass, Eddie Merckx in terms of Tour de France victories. Obviously, he's got to get another four Giro d'Italia of Valtteri Espana, our record, you know, get him, the only race Eddie didn't win was Het Boil. But Tadej, you couldn't see it. You couldn't put that past him, would you, the way he's riding.

Every race he goes out and does, he goes out to win in the same style. And it's something we haven't seen since Eddie Merckx. We were talking about you and you know, your first time you would break sweat would be the Circuit de la Sarthe, wouldn't it? And any Tour winner that was hoping to be good in July. I think that would be Jalapem Chubby as well. He used to be up front. Yeah, Chubby and Doris.

A bit like him as well. But like any, any, any, we haven't seen this since the time of Eddie Merckx where you'd be dominant from January to the last race of the season. And on that, on that note, if he carries on like this, he will surpass Eddie as the greatest. The way he's riding, he's doing it in the manner of Eddie Merckx. So explain this to me, Bradley, because you guys were in the team, the first team that came out with marginal gains, planning better than anybody up at the time. I would argue it wasn't the first team, but.

Well, yeah, they came out later on. But I feel like everything was planned to the detail. There are peaks throughout the year. But this is this guy's an anomaly. Like, how do you how are you so good from, like you said, the first race of the year in UAE? Yeah. So right now, too. Well, I think, yeah, I mean, what will also define him as the greatest is anyone.

I mean, it's when you transcend the sport and what he's doing is he's changing the sport again. Merck's changed the sport back then and Eddie is now, Taddy is changing the sport again, the way we view the sport, the way we think, the tradition. Cycling is all about tradition, isn't it? And he's breaking those traditional patterns. And I think that's what's special about him. And, you know, he's up there, if not, he's the second greatest patterns. And I think that's what's special about him. And he's up there. If not, he's the second greatest of all time, as it stands today with his results. But let's wait till the end of his career.

I mean, he will surpass the greatest. Yeah. And we oftentimes find ourselves, because the rider, this generation, they're just getting so much better, so much stronger, so much younger. Right. So the big question out there is, and we were just chatting about this last time, my last tour, I was 35 years old. Right. Yeah.

Is this now a generation that isn't going to race into their 30s? That we don't know. Right. But if it is, if he if he has the legs to continue, this is going to be insane. Spencer made a good job, a good point when we're watching it. This isn't even his day job. Right now, you know, he's going out there right against the second greatest of his generation in Machu Van der Pol. And he rode him off the wheel. And it was just a matter of time before he did that with every attack he did.

Wasn't it? Yeah. Let's, who was the last guy, aside from Eddie Merckx, Bernard O'Knoll that set out to win Paris Reveille. That was a Tour de France GC guy. He's one of them. And we're on the brink of seeing him probably go back to back potentially, obviously, it's a whole different race. And we're going to talk about it later.

But I mean, like you said, this guy just does whatever he wants. We were Johan and I were at Flanders last year or two years ago. And we spoke to his director and he's like, he shows up to every race, whether it's Rueda del Sol, which nobody cares about, or the Tour of Flanders. And he's like, I want to win. And I'm going to tell my guy, he tells his guys like, I want to win. The director's like, well, why don't we just take it easy on this race

and try to train? He's like, no, I want to win. So his mentality is something we've never seen before. And I think the thing that stand, which can always stand out in a race like Tour of Flanders, is especially when the weather is bad and the elements come into play, you have things happen, whether it's mechanicals, flats, crashes, that affect the race.

We didn't have it. I mean, yes, Vanderpool hit the deck, seemingly got back on fairly quickly. Of course, that always the race. We didn't have, I mean, yes, Vanderpool hit the deck, seemingly got back on fairly quickly. Of course, that always takes energy. But I mean, this was a race that they were all there. There was, nobody had any excuses. And in fact, Matt Peterson was pretty clear in his post-race interview.

He just kind of shrugged and said, look, you just rode away fair and square, which is the way you want it to play out, right? This is a different world, right? If Vanderpool doesn't get up or gets back up, and it's just not the same. He looked fine. They were all there.

Ghana was there for a hot second. He was in the break and looked like he was going to be able to stay there. You're like, this is a repeat of Milan San Remo. These are the Galacticos. We're all here. Let's go. And it didn't this is a repeat of Milan San Remo. These are the Galacticos. We're all here. Let's go. And it didn't matter.

He just did what he wanted. Yeah, against when it's van der Poel head to head with Pogacar, it might not look like much, but that crash, that adds extra stress. Having to work your way back up to the front, yes, he makes it look easy. He had to stop and get back on his race back, which you talked about.

Spare bike can be as dialed in as possible, but like Bradley mentioned, it's never exactly the same. So we saw him stop again, which I can assure you with 80 kilometers to go in Tour of Flanders, the level is so high, they're going so fast, the stress so high, just stopping for 10 seconds to change a bike is a massive deal. There's a funny one that is that your spare bike is never the same. No matter how many times they ask you to go and ride it and check it out make sure it's is never the same. Never the same. You know it I mean you just cannot dial it. And that's what people were asking why did he change back to his race bike because that's the one that is

the most comfortable. Yeah. They were talking on the coverage that was this a planned stop and I don't know what they meant by that, but I think it was planned to get back on. I mean, they obviously had to check it over and maybe make some adjustments or something like that. It's probably more of like, well, if we see an opportunity for you to get back on your race bike, he'd probably be like, I want to do that. So they're on a sort of non-technical road, maybe a headwind for 5K. They know exactly where they're going next.

OK, now this is the time. If we're going to do it, there's no other time than now. So they probably planned that, but still not ideal by any means. Yeah. And we do talk about this, at least in the last handful of years with Tour of Flanders. And you see this when you watch the race.

I mean, this is, and we talk a lot about tradition and the history of cycling. In the old days, the organizers of the Tour of Flanders like, oh yeah, we'll go over there and we'll hit the Quermont. Oh yeah, then we'll go over here and we'll hit the Bosberg. And then we'll go hit, you know, the Pottersburg, all these things. Right. Walter and the whole this new organization that has bought up Tour of Flanders

and really built a whole series of races, I think, is revolutionizing modern cycling from a spectator standpoint, you watch the race and you see just that atmosphere on the Quermont. Boy, that's hot. Like, I don't I don't really care to go to any bike races ever. I've been there. I can just read it. I've watched that on my. Whoa. That's how it is now for sale, isn't it?

You have to spy pay to watch them. Yeah, I believe that. Yeah. Yeah, it's great? You have to spy pay to watch on that implement. I believe that. Yeah. Yeah, it's great. A lot of people don't understand the Tour of Flanders and the last essentially 100 miles of the race, they're within a 25-mile radius.

I mean, they're just doing little loops amongst loops. And it's very easy for spectators. I mean, there's millions of spectators on the side of the road. And so like you said, the organizer has really revolutionized the spectator aspect of the race. Totally agree. Shout out to Matt Peterson, hung in there.

And also, honorable mention, Jasper Stueven, who came up really, if we go back to the history of not just the Shab-Malajanis, we sponsored a development team with Livestr Strong many years ago. Tried to identify a bunch of great young riders. Jasper Steuben was on that team. Taylor Finney was on that team. But it's always great.

We won a San Remo a few years ago. It's always cool to see some of our alum going through. Yeah, not only that, hometown race for him. I mean, it doesn't get any bigger than that. But so for him to be in the final move, helping his teammate out, I mean, huge result for that team. Also, massive shout out for Wout Van Aert. I mean, he was there.

He wasn't scared. He attacked the titans of the sport right before the Quarry Mouth, tried to get a little gap. And we thought, OK, he's done. But he ended up having a nice steady pace with the Quarry Mouth pass, with the end of the pull. And I was really excited to see him back at the top of his game.

Yeah. Keep in mind, too, I mean, we touched on at the beginning, said it's the fastest Flanders in history. There's a lot of things that go into that. The conditions certainly help. Lack of crashes certainly help. Let's raise 170 miles. Under six hours.

Under six hours. I mean, I'm out. Like, no thank you. About 170 miles over that terrain with the nerves. It's okay. Tade finished in five hours and 58 minutes. I thought I was seeing things. Yeah. Well, we haven't really touched upon, I mean, they're racing faster, they're going faster, they're breaking all these KOMs. The equipment is really touched upon. I mean, they're racing faster. They're going faster. They're breaking all these cams. The equipment is a lot different. I mean, I can assure you, riding the stuff we rode back in the day,

25 mil tires, 28 max. I don't even know if we had those now. They're on 30 mil tires, sometimes even bigger, a lot less air pressure. You roll over those cables a lot smoother, but it's still as hard as it can get for sure. Johan sent us a note this morning. Vanderpoel rode 30 mil tires and ran about 60 PSI. So that's a big difference. I mean, even on the Koppenberg, I did it two years ago.

It was pouring rain and I did the fun ride the day before Tour of Flanders, 15,000 people do it, so it's just walls of cyclists all day long, and we hit the Kopenberg on a wet road, and I'm sort of navigating my way through this bunch of riders where it's, with our old school equipment, you're not making it, you're walking. But with 30 mil tires, low air pressure, you're actually like, oh, I can actually make it up this

without much problem, so it's a big, big difference nowadays. Spencer also sent us a note. 17 of the last 21 major one day races, so monuments, Olympics, and world championships, 17 out of the last 21 have been won solo. Which is also, I mean, you see that, right? And we talked about it as the race was unfolding. Now, we, I think, all thought that those four behind,

all with their own interests, and certainly were interested in chasing him down, just couldn't. You see that a lot, right? Where the guy gets the jump, whether it's a lucky jump or a good jump, and they can't get organized. But today, they just can't get organized, but today they just couldn't get together. But 17 of the last 21 solo.

Yeah, I mean, I think they got it together. They just had nothing less than compared to Boguchar. He just rolled away from them. I had a question as I was watching, because you were talking about, and you're going to have thoughts on this, Bradley. But I tell you what, you did not about this, you're going to you're going to have thoughts on this Bradley, but I'll tell you what you did not see today, which you see every year, every year for the last 40 years you see in this race.

And that is some presence from a Patrick LeFevre team. Where was Quickstep? Yeah. Where's the Wolfpack? Have we starved the Wolfpack? Nowhere. They were in the break. This is I don't even think I saw the breakaway. This is their race. That's like saying the Dallas Cowboys, there's just other teams playing like it at Texas Stadium or whatever they call it now. Yeah, agreed. Where is that? That's a great point. Yeah.

That's probably linked with the fact that he's not there. He sold the team so he is not there. But I think he was a big driving factor. Where's the DNA? Well, let's not forget they have Remco, Evan Kuhl, so they're changing their DNA. I mean, they're trying to sort of target different races. I mean, they have the Olympic champion arguably next to Poguchar and Vindigo, the best stage racer,

grand tour rider in the world. So they clearly made some investments there. And it's becoming quite obvious in races like today. Yeah, but yeah. All right. Well, look, I mean, it gets, it's just not, it's so wildly impressive. And it's fun to watch.

Yeah. It's fun to watch. If you're Jonas Wengergaard sitting at home on, you must be wondering. I don't know what he, next weekend, Perry Rebay. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's a big group. Let's save that, because I want to,

we should go around the horn and sort of rate his chances. I have a feeling there will be a consensus here. But I just want to talk about Tadej's chances in a race like Perry Reveille, which is similar in the respect that it's cobbled, but it's totally flat, totally different. Mind you, I've never done it, so I have no idea. Thank god.

Do you ever think about doing it? Never. Never. No. You would watch it, though. He would be a backseat driver calling Johan on the cell phone. He'd be like, tell George to do this. Tell George to do that and you know it's like bro he's in the race what do you want me to do but yeah I know myself yeah today's show also brought to you by helix

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at oneskin.co, not dot com. Oneskin.co. Get you some too. You know, going back to the Atiya thing, he said, how many people stop you in the street? And you're like, well, it looked a lot different now. Yeah. Well, you should try some once again.

Maybe you'd go back to it. There's nothing to do with that. What does it have to do with? Probably my weight. He's jacked. Now he's yoked. What else did we make a note of here? That's all right.

Should we talk a little bit about Perry Rubey before we take some questions from the live audience here at Melojani's? Let's just start. We'll just go around the horn. Look, I'm done trying to predict what this kid's going to do or not do. It is, and again, as I disclaimed a second ago, I've never done it.

We've done Perry Roubaix-esque stages in the Tour de France. Those are like going to Disneyland compared to the real Roubaix, right? They're just sort of teasers. But there's a lot more. I did check the weather for as accurate as it can be in that part of France. Mid-60s, dry.

So that helps a little bit. But there's still elements of certainly flat tires, other mechanicals, crashes. But if he's there. He will be there. He will be there. I mean, if he's there without the potential issues. He'll be there, but I don't think

it's going to be as dominant a performance as today. I think it will be more level. You know what it's like riding on the flat cobbles as opposed to going uphill. And I think van der Poel is going to be back in prime position for next week. I think that race suits him more. But Tadej will be there.

But I can't see him. I mean, who knows? But I can't see him. I mean, who knows? But I can't see him making gaps and riding away on a flat cobbled section from the likes of Vandepoel like he did today on the uphill sections. Well, Van Aert looks like he's getting better as well. I mean, that race has made more for him than this weekend. I agree.

And his team was looking really good. That's Peterson. I think he's coming away with a lot of confidence from today. And let's go back to San Remo, where the only person to be able to hang on Pogatar's wheel was Matthew Vanderpool. And the difference between San Remo and today is today is just relentless onslaught of climbs.

I mean, you had the Quarimont, the Kappenberg, all of these climbs back to back to back. And he was attacking from 60K to go. So he was just kind of like, Vanderpool was dying by death of a thousand deaths. They all were. Fast forward a week to Paris-Roubaix. If you're efficient, like we know Vanderpool is, you can save a lot more energy on the

flats, know exactly where to be, when to be. I agree with you, Bradley. There's no way he's going to be, I don't you, Bradley, there's no way he's gonna be, I don't think, I mean, we've been wrong, but I can't imagine him being as dominant. And tactics, as we saw today, they're starting to come into play. Like they weren't, Van De Pol was all in

with pulling with Pogachara, but the other guys weren't. They're like, look, you're dropping us on every climb. Why are we gonna pull through with you? We know we're gonna get dropped, so we might as well try to conserve energy. When you get through a bay and they're doing that, the wind changes all the time. No climbs, easier to sit in, conserve and use tactics to your advantage if you have a strong team.

So I think it could be even more exciting. You could see Pugacar today, he was dependent on the climbs to make his gaps. Absolutely. And when they managed to stay with him over the top of the Kwamun, the first time he wasn't able to continue to force that gap. So I think in Power Rebellion is going to be, I mean, as he said, he accepts the challenge at the finish today, but it's a whole different race. And I think today was an exceptional performance,

but it's difficult to see him doing that again and replicating it in Power Rebellion. Yeah, I'm curious what Johan thinks. Who cares what Johan thinks? He might be listening right now. And then there's always the, which would be Johan's question, is this smart? I get it, right? You should just fuck him with people. This is awesome.

I love that. But is you just you just you just fucking with people. This is awesome. I love that. But is it a smart idea? Because there are things that can go wrong in Perry Bay. Right. You can end a career in Perry Bay. All right. You George, you've had some gnarly crashes of Johan. Museo had a yeah, certainly a career altering crash in Perry Bay. There's there. Bad things can go on there.

So is that a smart thing to do? That's neither here nor there because he's gonna start the race, but, which. I think what today, what we saw was UAE took the race on with the view that Pagaccio was the ultimate favorite. They raced as if he was the favorite. I don't think they'll race next week in Pirie-Rabé like that. I think Van

der Poel's team will do that because I would say Van der Poel's out right favorite next week. And from that, we can see limited numbers in terms of people around Van der Poel and the likes of, you know, as we saw today, Ghana, Kung, those guys will be, you know, could be the surprise ones. It might not come from the group of favorites are winning next week and it's more likely that, you know, guys could slip the net that we weren't expecting. I agree. And it is more likely, in my opinion, to see a team like Visma, Lisa Bike, and Ineos

to have more guys represented towards the final. When you have more guys represented, what do you do? You can use these guys to jump away, get in breakaways, get up ahead of the race. So I feel like in terms of teams, these teams might be slightly stronger next weekend, definitely more experience and hopefully we'll have more numbers to give Poetjar a harder time to just ride away by himself. They'll use the team's strength to the advantage. And the Kudik have got not just Vanderpult on a race like Rubai,

have they? They've got, certainly, Philipson. Yeah, Philipson's got second before. Second before. So they've got other cards they can play, which I think they will do to attempt to draw out Pogacar. Before we take questions from the audience here, and I'm going to say this at the top of the show, as we did wake up this morning, which was really cool, not that we woke up, we knew we

were we knew we were waking up, but George got a phone call that his son Enzo won his first race in Europe. We've been, you know, we've been hyping this kid. I was, for a long time, I was like, it just makes George feel good. Like, I don't know if he's any good. That's a joke. I know he's good.

But this is the first, I mean, to win your first race in Europe. First UCI race, yeah, in Europe. Yeah. And just, and then we FaceTimed with him. Right, he must have been five minutes after the finish. His play by play of the race, it was just classic Enzo. Yeah, so I woke up at like four in the morning

and looked at my phone from my son Enzo. He's like, dad, it's snowing. I was like, oh, I put the phone away. I'm like, OK, good luck with that. And then the second text was I got a text from a team guy. He's like, congratulations. I'm like, for what? He's like, Enzo just won.

So that's how I found out. That's how my hour morning started. It was really exciting. Cool. Let's do some questions. Do 10, 15 minutes of questions. Yeah, let's go. Let's start with the young lady.

How did it take you to learn how to ride professionally? How long did it take me or us? How long did it take? The question is, how long did it take us to learn how to ride professionally? I'll go first. I mean, I got a bike when I was 13 years old. So I would just ride.

I lived in North Texas, Plano specifically. And at that time, Plano, there was nothing out there. So I would just go explore. And I felt like I was a professional. What is different from now to back then is you wouldn't have been able to watch these races. The Tour of Flanders, for example, which is what we're talking about,

you would have read about. And you would have read about it probably weeks later in a VeloNews or something. You weren't able to. We watched the race today on flow bikes. We weren't looking at that as an example. Or like we would watch like when I was a kid, I would watch the Olympics.

And I would watch swimming. And so I could see it. I didn't have that in cycling. So I was just sort of pretending when I was out there But that's that's really how I learned and you start on the track So maybe that might start on the track, but when I was 13, you know 33 years ago I watched this man win the World Championships in Norway when you were 21 I was 13 and you beat all my heroes at that time. All the people that I'd watched in the Tour de France, Indray, Moussa, Ludwig, Chmiel, Capio, Kipuchi. And it was raining, of course.

The next day I went and raced over in East London and it was raining and I thought I was you. You know, that inspiration piece. You know, you always pretend to be your heroes and you can never change how someone makes you feel or made you feel at a certain time. And we were all inspired by someone, weren't we? Watching someone race and hoping to emulate them in some way.

Yeah, I think for everybody's different, we all kind of sort of took a very non-traditional path. I mean, Texas, London, New York City. But it was just about the passion and the drive and the love of the sport. And then never giving up, just always dreaming. And I think we're all super blessed to be able to be part of such a great sport and sitting up here today talking about our favorite sport.

Thanks. Yeah, good question. Great question. Yeah. You guys see the future of cycling driving in America. It's huge in Europe, obviously. Yes. You guys see the future of cycling growing in America. It's huge in Europe. Obviously, there's all tours and everything else,

but it's continuing to grow in just the next five, 10 years. How do you keep going? The question is, how do we see the future of cycling in the US? And so just a question on that from an industry standpoint or a racing competitive standpoint? From a racing competitive standpoint? A racing competitive standpoint. I mean, I think it ebbs and flows. It always has.

And that's in our generation, right? You had things like the Tour of California. But before that, you had Tour de Pont, which originally was called the Tour de Trump, which is crazy. You all are like, no, it didn't. I'm like, yes, it did. Before that, you had the Decourus Classic back in Colorado.

So these, I think, you need, we talk also a lot about this younger crop of American riders. We just talked about Enzo. I mean, you start to see a Matteo Jorgensen come up and be a tour contender. I think that helps grow the sport from an industry standpoint. But also, it encourages promoters to say, hey,

we've got these. We have stars. We have American stars. So let's go stand up an American event. I read in recent weeks there's talk of bringing back a stage race to Colorado, a pro tour stage race, or a world tour stage race, we will see. I think you have to have those.

They're hard to put on. They're hard to fund. And they're hard to sustain for whatever reason. And so TBD. But fingers crossed. Yeah, we have a great sort of talent pool of American cyclists now. I mean, they're scattered all over the world. We have, you know, five, six guys that are making a real impact in the sport

and are continuing to get better and better. So that's certainly going to help grow the sport here in the U.S. Yeah, and by the way, the stage or the race that Enzo won the stage today was won by an American. So these are some of the best juniors in the world. Zo wins the stage. Michael Berry's son wins the GC. That's right.

So it's coming. I mean, I think if you look, we will have another tour winner. I don't know when, if that's in 10 or 20 or 30 years from now. But this country knows one bike race. I mean, they just, for better or worse, that's the one that they know and they pay attention to. So it obviously is better if we have an American presence. Look, I mean, there's years in recent years

where we had three Americans. Three at the Tour de France. That's hard to build competitive events in the US if you're fielding three Americans at the Tour, and there's nine Australians, for example. So we'll get there. Yep. Speaking of Americans and recent policies, recently,

I don't know what he has in his history. They've seen. What do you think about his chances at the Bay? Any podium? I'm in it for. I'd say Pallas is more of a climber, sort of the classic guy.

I think you saw, I saw you won last week, which a very cagey victory. Super cagey. But I think he needs those hills. And I actually I'm not even sure he's doing it. I think they saw he won last week, which is a very cagey victory. Super cagey. But I think he needs those hills. And actually, I'm not even sure he's doing it. I think they would probably try to save him for Liège and races like that.

But he's a scrapper. Yeah. I mean, no doubt he can do a good race, but I don't even know if they're sending him. No. Yeah. What did you guys think about while attacking with two teammates coming up 10 seconds back

before the climb and then he essentially did, he helped create the counterattack for his opponent and these teammates in the wind. Was that Wout just thinking, still wanting the win, and not really thinking this is 160 plus miles, I need to be a little more caging? What are your thoughts on that? As I see Wigo's wheel spinning. No, I think in that last 30th question. Yeah, repeat the question.

You repeat the question. The question was, what was our thoughts on Wout Menard attacking at the bottom of the Quarry Mount when his teammates were just 10 seconds behind coming back? I think in the latter stages of the race, it's a lot of time tactics go out the window. It was clear the fact that those two teammates had been dropped, that they were on their last legs. We were watching it saying, these guys have got nothing left.

It becomes just a slog to the finish at that point. And you could see everyone was on their last legs. And well, if anything, was it an attack or did you just keep that momentum rolling? Because one thing with the Quam on it is you don't want it to ease up too much before you hit that climb because it makes it even harder. You know, you want to carry as much speed onto the cobbled section because you go from Tarmac Road to Cobbles and the speed just drops off dramatically. Those guys are already sort of on their last legs.

So I think it was more a case of him just keeping the momentum going than attacking really. If anything, it would assist those two guys from behind in coming back. I wouldn't say it teed up Tadej to attack. Tadej was going to attack whatever, whether they were doing a track stand going onto the climb or whether they were doing it 40k an hour. I don't think it made a great deal of difference to the overall result of the race. I think it was just a case of every man for themselves at that point. It speaks to the difficultness of the race. I mean, yes, typically you'd want to wait

for your teammates and think strength in numbers, but like Bradley said, these guys were on their last match. They worked together at one point, Jason, and it's just everybody was given everything they had. So it was just essentially survival mode. And I was actually very impressed that Woud took the race in his hands and went for it, which I think is going to speak to a lot in his confidence going into next weekend. The team was good. There were a lot of his confidence going into next weekend. The team was good, there were, you know,

a lot of guys were still up there and I think they did everything they could possibly do today and the outcome would have remained the same. I see you live in a world of athletic specialization, not just in cycling but in all other sports. Given how day's versatility, and with an hour record holder in that presence, is there a window of time that starts to narrow and this capability to achieve something like that given all of his other perspectives? but I don't think it adds anything to his greatness.

One of the things with the hour record is you don't get anything for it other than the prestige of holding the hour record. And it's great for the bike companies that get involved in terms of producing the best bike and the best equipment. But from what else he could possibly do in the sport, I think the hour record is actually just something that gets in the way.

So no, unfortunately, I don't think that's on his on his radar at the moment. I think there are other races that will add to his overall greatness at the end of his career other than the hour. I don't think you need the hour record anymore to to I don't think it's the one thing that can be missing at the end of your career. I found we had a great conversation the other night. And like you said, we have an hour former hour record holder right here amongst our in our presence. And Riley speak to the audience and our viewers how extremely

hard the hour record is mentally and physically how much every piece of your body must hurt. I mean, it's, it's a sustained effort for an hour. So, so obviously the first, you know, it's not like a road time trial where you've got so many variables and things that, you know, corners to break the ride up, certain bits of wind that can affect the course. You've got to ride a black line around a track for one hour with a stadium full of people. The black line is 250 meters round, that's how it's measured. You've got six inches under the

black line which you can cut the corner each time. So you know, every time you go under the black line it shortens the distance of each lap. But people don't realize with the velodrome, your speed traces, if you were to look at a speed trace over an hour, you're constantly doing that. Because when you go into the banking, it's essentially going downhill, so you gain three or four kilometers an hour in the middle of the banking. So if you ride the track in a particular way, you can make profit most from the middle of the banking to maximize the speed.

But to do that, you're essentially going downhill. So, you press on into the banking to raise your power as well. So, your power trace is constantly like that as well. So, it's not just 450 watts flat out throughout. You back off into the straights as well. So, you've got 220 laps, two times each lap on the banking. So, that's 440 times you're going through the banking, picking up speed, slowing off, picking up speed,

slowing off, so you've got something to think about the whole way. You've got to contend with the crowd that are in there. The only way you can get any reference to how you're going, you can't have a speed box in front of you, you can't have power, so you've got your coach on the inside of the track who takes the stopwatch on the previous lap, and if your lap splits at 14.6,

he will walk one step towards you, whichotes one tenth of a second or one step away from you which denotes one tenth of a second so if you're on 14.5 lap splits and he walks one step towards you when you come around for the previous lap you're on 14.6 so you've got to up the speed a little bit and you've got to keep him on that line for one hour so there's so much going on that occupies your concentration. So it's not just a case of riding around thinking, okay, how long have I got to go? I've got 40 minutes left. And the time drags at times, it goes fast at times, and you're hallucinating

the last seven, eight minutes. And it's quite a feat, which is what deters lots of people from going for the hour record, because they go away, they look at what are the numbers, what are the speeds I have to ride, they get a track, they do a 10-minute effort to see what that feels like. And most of the time, at that point, they put the hour record on the back burner because they think, I've got to do that for an hour. And the thing with the hour record is, there's no second place. You either do it or you fail. Well, I don't know about y'all, but I could have just listened to that for an hour.

That was sick. Anybody have any more hour record questions? I feel like, damn. That's why I'm here. Yeah. In the next, say, 10, 20 years, which do you think will make the biggest difference to the speed of cycling, the bottom, the nutrition, or the training methods that people use? That's a good question. That's a great question.

The question was, what will make the biggest difference to the speed of the sport, the bikes, the technology around the bikes, the nutrition and the training. You know when I think back to sort of my tour in 2012, you retired in 2012 didn't you? Did we think, someone asked me, did we think when we were at 2012 the sport would be where it is today in terms of how they're racing? It would have been unimaginable, wouldn't it? Totally unimaginable. And so to think where it will be in another 15 years time and how they'll be racing, I can only see it going backwards in some ways because it can't keep this momentum up.

What do you think, Lance? I don't think a lot about it, to be honest with you, but I don't think a lot about it, to be honest with you. But look, I think the answer is all of the above. The thing that I find the most interesting is the nutrition piece. I mean, what they're doing on the nutrition side. And you see it in the races, right? Tadej Pogacar, yes, he probably trains harder than anybody else.

But the repeated attacks, the ability to recover and sustain and just keep going, that's a nutrition thing. Like his tank, we all have cars or e-cars or whatever. You can tell. You have some sort of fuel gauge. My tank's starting to get empty. You're not able to do that.

These guys are packing in, guys and gals are packing in 80 to 120 grams of carbohydrates an hour. Speaking of our day and age, if we tried that, you would be sick immediately. The gut is not able to absorb that. We used to work on one gram, didn't we, per kilo? You have to work up to that. And it takes them a long time.

Speaking of Peter Tia, he had Tade on the show talking about nutrition and how hard it was for him to build up to consuming 100 grams of carbohydrates in an hour, every hour. So they just have so much fuel. Now, on top of that, yes, the bike and especially the wheels, the tires, the tire pressure has really changed. And the training's changed.

But that fueling piece, that's why you see what you see. Look at him at the end. Four of the best guys in the world chasing him. His tank was full. Into the headwind. I mean, if the tank is empty, you cannot do that. So I'm always, if I do, just sort of sit back and observe. I mean, this nutrition piece is big.

Yeah, I would agree. And I think that's gonna continue to evolve like all technologies. And we're gonna see new nutrition methods as well. But I mean, it's hard to imagine them getting faster. The bike's getting faster, the bike's getting lighter. I mean, the UCI has already limited the weight of the bike. So I think nutrition is probably the one thing that'll

continue to evolve the most. Yep. Take a couple more. Yep. Two more. Thank you for yesterday's ride. That was a great time. Who else can say they rode with a knight in the king's service?

That was awesome. The 100 other people that were there can say it. Not him. Oh, not him. Not this guy. OK. Well, he woke up. He's like, yeah, it's 55 and raining.

Is he carrying a sword? Is he taking me today? Yeah. What time? Yeah. He didn't have a sword. What's going through Bander Paul's head right now? And you're expected to win that race.

And now he's on the bus. Right. Can you just brush that aside and move on? I didn't see a post-race interview with him. Let's see if there's anything. I think I think he's got the crash to fall back on. Yeah, I think he's got the crash to fall back on. That's he's got a jail card, you know? And I mean, let's not forget there, they're one in one right now.

He beat him in San Remo, which arguably could have been a better race for poker trucks of the climbs. Um, and then made up that gap in Flanders or the race before that. And said, we went through the ditch over the, you know, and then, Oh, then that was in, you know, so that's right. I was in Stratobianca. Yeah. To say a crash. But every crash is different.

Every crash. We actually don't know how much that affected him during the race. I mean, we'll find out in post race, I guess. Yeah, we don't know. And there, I mean, Van Pohl's won every one day race I think he's done this year, except for today. I mean, I don't think he's disappointed. And I think he's still really confident for next weekend.

Yeah, so here's some comments at his post race. I had to fight hard today because I was at the limit so quickly, he admitted at the finish line. The fact that I still managed to get to the podium is only due to my experience and willpower. Tade was simply the strongest. Whoever reaches the top of the Coeur Mount first is usually the strongest.

And today, that was clear. OK. And that's what we saw. I mean, that's what you witnessed. You got a question over here? Actually, I had a question for George. Congratulations, your son winning. Did you have any advice sending him over to Europe

that you wish he would have had going over there? Well, thank you. The question was, did I have any advice for Enzo that I wish that I had going in? Yeah, certainly, like I mentioned earlier, we all had a sort of non-traditional path to cycling. Mine was growing up racing in New York City

against Europeans, South Americans, adults that, even though they weren't professional cyclists, they were very good. And they wanted to win at all costs. So I was always fighting with these guys. So when I got to Europe, it didn't seem like that big of a deal because I was used to getting pushed around by adults. And I kind of enjoyed that experience.

But my first the first race my son did was in Belgium. And he's like, Dad, there was a crash at the start. And I didn't get to the front till 80 K to go. He said, why is it so hard to get into the front? And I told him, like, we all know any race that you do in Belgium or really northern Europe, for that matter, is like it so hard to get into the front? And I told him, like we all know, any race that you do in Belgium or really Northern Europe for that matter, is like you have to go in with a war mentality.

Like you're going to war. You got no friends. You pretty much have to risk your life to stay in the front. You always have to be fighting to move forward. Otherwise during the back of the Peloton, you give an inch, they take a mile. And I just said, go in with war mentality, fight like

you really said you said welcome to belgium and welcome to belgium i mean that get used to it because yes racing in america is hard but we race on roads the size of highways and positioning isn't a factor belgium is like you race on a road you're on a highway and next thing you know you take a left turn you're on a bike path with 200 guys trying to know that that bike path's coming, they're all fighting to be there, so I just said, go into every race in Belgium or Northern Europe like it's a war and be ready, be prepared, and just full focus, full moska.

It is worth noting, right? And if anybody that's listened to this show for years, I just got had all these, I said, why do you have these friends, right? And he was like, oh, you gotta make friends. It's worth noting that what does he say to his very own son? This, why do you have these friends? Right? And he was like, oh, you got to make friends. It's worth noting that what does he say to his very own son? This is war and you have no friends.

That's exactly what I just heard. He's learning. This guy's like, so you're having coffee with these guys for the start? Not having coffee. No. But now we see, fast forward. After the race, you go, hey, man, sorry. Sorry, kind of threw you in the ditch there. But I love you caught it. No. This is a fine line. Now we see. Fast forward. After the race, you go, hey, man, sorry.

Sorry, kind of threw you in the ditch there. But I love you, man. Let's get a coffee later today. That was good. All right, one more. Yes, ma'am. Oh, we'll do two more. I was staring here.

OK, two more. The two mans. Yes, mans. Just want to take this opportunity to say thank you, clan, for this show that has been fantastic here okay two more the two mans yes mans thank you I know I've been to the Tour de France three times in the year. And everybody in my tour group is so supportive of you. And I just want to say thank you. Thank you.

That's very sweet. Awesome. Thank you. I want to say thank you for the wonderful years of racing, and the thrills, and spills, and chills of all that time. Awesome. Thank you. Not a question.

No, that's great. We appreciate it. Look, I mean, it's not lost on us. We started the show many, many years ago. And it, of course, has evolved over the years. And I get asked a lot. I know it's not a question, but I guess I'm going to give you some kind of an answer.

Alcida, thank you. I get asked a lot about the show and what it's like to create a big podcast. And the answer is really simple. My life has been very colorful and complicated. But we live in a day and age where anybody, anybody, anybody in this room, anybody in this world can create content. If my life had been colorful and complicated 20, 30 years ago, we wouldn't be having, you and me, would not be having this conversation.

But we live in this day and age and anybody can create content and I'm very thankful and grateful for that. And it's not lost on, certainly not lost on me and it's not lost on us that the audience has come back and showed up the way that they have. And so it's amazing. I mean, we tried to not take ourselves very seriously, clearly.

But it's been cool to see. So thank you. Thank you. OK, this is the last one. Do you know what's going on with Jonas Vingo? Do we know what's going on with Jonas Vingo? Do we know what's going on with Jonas Vingo? I do. He had a crash.

Not decent, but a fairly significant crash in Peronies, right? I think he's the X factor here. If you think about the tour, you're still going to talk about four guys, right? Obviously, Tade, Jonas, Primoz Roglic, and Remko. I guess we'll, I don't even know if he races as a liege, but. I mean, is his next race, Delfini?

I mean, that would be, that feels like a long time from now. But they don't race that much. We always felt like we had to race to really fine tune our form and get that intensity that you just couldn't replicate in training. They can somehow simulate these things. And let's not forget the.

Look what he did last year. He didn't race at all after pay boss. During this time he was in a life threatening crash and didn't race at all until the Tour de France so he's he's already ahead of last year and hopefully I think he might have broke his wrist in the last crash but hopefully he's back on the road and there's no way he can have uh well he's certainly not as bad as last year right now. Yeah and he's still got second. And do we think his team there's no way he can have, well, he's certainly not as bad as last year right now. And he's still got second. And do we think his team, just to me, Jumbo or Lisa Bike, they were good today, right?

But if you just look at it at a high level, this is not the same team that it was one, two, three years ago. Now, you've got a kid like Matteo Jorgensen, who has performed exceptionally well, won peri-nis. Many are talking about him as somebody who could develop into a tour winner. But the team has changed, which affects the whole package and certainly affects Vingagard.

Yeah. All right, everybody. Thanks for coming down. Thanks for tuning in if you're not here. Many of you are not here, but we will see you in a week's time. Wait, you're going to be over there. You're going to be over there? You're going to see Zo race?

Yeah, my son's racing the junior. But you're going to be at Perry Rebey're going to see Zo race. My son's racing the Junior Rebellion. But you're going to be at Perry Rebellion. I'm going to watch the previous finish. It should be fun. That's where you're going to see them in the douches. In the douches, exactly. This weird former pro walking around the showers. That would be a podcast.

Yeah. Anyways, thanks for tuning in, everybody. Thanks for coming out. Thank you. That would be a podcast. Yeah. Anyways, thanks for tuning in everybody. Thanks for coming out. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.