Spin Cycle is Escape Collective’s news digest, published every Monday and Friday. You can read it on this website (obviously) or have it delivered straight to your inbox.
Spin Cycle
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Hello!
Welcome back to Spin Cycle, Escape Collective’s news digest.
It was one of those weekends where the reality of the cycling world we are used to seemed to bend slightly. We had Soudal-Quick Step’s PR department issuing press releases about its own victories, more milk-related drama for the professional peloton, a Van Aert is winning bike races again, and Jake Paul has returned, but with his WorldTour allegiance switched. Who’d have guessed!
Sponsorship activations and deactivations galore!
“Soudal and T-Rex Quick-Step take team’s 35th victory of 2024,” the most recent PR email from the Belgian cycling team proudly rang out as it hit my inbox last Friday afternoon.
What could this be? A cyclocross race I had somehow managed to overlook? Yves Lampaert winning a winter tractor criterium in his neighbourhood? Nope, it was winning “gold in the Sponsorship Activation category at the Belgian Sponsorship Awards.” And you know no-one loves a sponsor activation more than us. Well, and the Belgian Sponsorship Awards. And probably Soudal-Quick Step, seeing as they won.
If you don’t sing your own praises, who else will? And not only was the team’s inflatable dinosaur terrorising fans and riders alike at this year’s Vuelta obviously a worthy winner, they’ve also insulated themselves from Patrick Lefevere saying they’re not producing enough victories for what he pays them. Checkmate, Pat!
On the opposite end of the spectrum, there is more bad news for the milk-based sponsors of the peloton. Well, actually, we shouldn’t say milk …
The trade body for Britain’s dairy industry has won its legal battle that vegan milk brand and EF women’s team sponsor Oatly can no longer call itself milk. A judge has ruled the word “milk” can only be used to describe milk produced by animals.
“Be under no illusion that making it harder to label and find dairy alternatives benefits the interests of Big Dairy and Big Dairy alone,” said Oatly’s British and Irish manager Bryan Carroll, rather ominously, after the ruling.
We enjoy the capitalising of Big Dairy in the quote. Very Much Something We’d Do.
🎩 Ebenezer Scrooge of the week 🎩
Now, we definitely don’t want to overdo any Dickensian references when talking about Ineos owner Big Jim Ratcliffe, but amidst the end of the Tom Pidcock saga last week as he headed to the (probably) warm embrace of Doug Ryder at Q36.5, discussion of Ineos Grenadiers’ future rumbles on. Lately, people have been pondering whether Ratcliffe will soon give up on bankrolling his now lacklustre cycling team, its shine dimmed even further by Pidcock’s departure.
But we can look to his other sporting investments for a bellwether of how the Ineos Grenadiers stack up in terms of disappointment. At Manchester United, he’s cancelled the traditional Christmas party for all staff, which is sure to boost morale for the struggling organisation. When Ineos Grenadiers have their party planning committee decommissioned, we’ll know things have taken a turn and Big Jim is Big Not Happy. However, it’s unlikely his mood is anywhere near sunshine and rainbows at the minute as he’s just sacked the Manchester United sporting director he spent millions appointing only five months ago. Sounds like Jim needs a party, to be honest.
Paul the other one
Fresh off of paying a 58-year-old man to let him beat him up, Jake Paul is back on his bike!
Around this time last year, we brought you ‘news’ that Paul was out riding in full Jumbo-Visma get-up thanks to his girlfriend Jutta Leerdam being a skater for the Dutch team of the same name.
But now, with that skating team defunct and Leerdam and Paul over in Abu Dhabi for the Grand Prix presumably as invited guests, he borrowed a UAE Team ADQ-branded Colnago. You can’t represent both WorldTour teams, Jake Paul, you have to choose your allegiance and stick to it!
In one of the videos posted (scroll to the right), you can actually see a glimmer of childlike wonder on Paul’s face, a second of humanity as he enjoys being out for a ride providing a break from the influencer-hellscape that has become his life. It’s nice! Then he begs for 30 seconds of rest to catch his breath amidst the desert heat. Less fake boxing and more bike riding Jake Paul!
“Jake Paul on a bike looks sick! But now on a Specialized bike,” Demi Vollering also posted in the comments, potentially prompted by Leerdam riding an S-Works Tarmac. But also, Vollering was probably doing her utmost to please her old/new paymasters at Specialized/FDJ-Suez, albeit in a slightly debasing way. We’ll allow one debasing social media interaction per season, Demi, so that’s yours used up until the end of 2025.
Feed Zone 🥖
🌪️ The weekend’s UCI Cyclocross World Cup round in Cabras, Sardinia, was cancelled due to extreme weather as storms swept across Europe. Lucinda Brand decided to pass the time off the bike by providing a weather report live from the scene.
🍷 40-year-old Yukiya Arashiro has managed to extend his professional career by another year, signing with Toscana Factory Team Vini Fantini after leaving Bahrain-Victorious. As The Inner Ring points out, not only will it likely make him the oldest rider in the pro ranks next year but the transfer makes a bunch of sense as winemaker Vini Fantini exports to Japan.
💹 Cycling sponsor Visma (which provides cloud accounting, payroll, invoicing, and HR business software products) is exploring a potential IPO, reports newspaper FD.
💸 Maxim Van Gils has officially signed with Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe after reaching an agreement to terminate his outstanding contract with Lotto-Dstny two weeks ago.
Cycling on TV 📺
Tuesday December 10th-Friday December 13th
No live racing …
For something to fill the void this week, we’re lifting a suggestion made by Scott Jaworski in the Spin Cycle Discord channel.
“Not sure if this is the right place to put this, but recently a friend found a remastered version of ‘A Sunday in Hell’ with English subtitles on YouTube. For those unfamiliar, it’s a documentary on the 1976 Paris-Roubaix. Not a short watch, but a pretty cool one.”
👏 Good guy of the week 👏
While Tadej Pogačar and Lotte Kopecky won the main Velo d’Or prizes, the retiring Luis Ángel Maté was awarded the first-ever Gino Mäder prize, which will now be given each year “in homage to Gino Mäder, the remarkable Swiss rider, whose career was notable both for its sporting achievements, but also his dedication to social and environment causes.”
At the end of this year’s Vuelta a España, his final professional road race, Maté rode the 650 km from Madrid back to his home in Marbella to raise awareness “about how we should change the modes of transport, in the interest of combating climate change for the good of the planet.”
Speaking in Paris at the awards ceremony, he said: “I have often said that we cyclists have the most beautiful stadiums in the world … we have the responsibility to take care of them.” He’s a good guy, Luis.
And finally …
Good news! Van Aert has won a bike racing again, a stage of an Indonesian stage race called the Tour de Siak (2.2).
Bernard van Aert, that is, a 27-year-old Indonesian rider who got his surname due to having a Dutch grandfather.
🧺 Send us yer laundry pics
“A laundromat in Katong Village shopping center, Singapore,” writes Ken Ooi attachign today’s featured laundromat.
As always, we are accepting your laundry photos (especially ones with the doors open so we can Photoshop riders inside the drum) to star in Spin Cycle. Either send them via the Discord or shoot me an email: [email protected]
Until next time …
That’s all folks! Thanks to Ken Ooi, Scott Jaworski, and Abby Mickey for contributions to today’s edition, and a big thank you to all of you who have signed up as Escape Collective members. If you haven’t, there is no time like the present. To smooth the process just click this link here and hit the Join Today button in the top right of the page.
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Spin Cycle
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