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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Welcome back to Spin Cycle, Escape Collective’s news digest.
A week can be a long time in politics bike racing, even in November, between some wintry champagne chugging to the return of Saudi whispers and even an Alberto Contador vs. Chris Froome face-off. But really, we’ll remember this week for being one where web design momentarily captured our hearts and minds.
Is it too late now to say Saudi? 🇸🇦
With the lack of racing currently, my mind has been allowed to wander, to ponder other pertinent questions. Questions such as: I wonder what the fellas over at Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund have been up to recently? Haven’t heard from them in a while.
Well! Turns out, according to Il Giornale, they are trying to buy Giro d’Italia organiser RCS. After causing a ruckus in golf with LIV Golf, doing deals with the ATP and WTA tennis tours as well as buying football club Newcastle United, it seems cycling could be next on the list.
Does this have anything to do with the OneCycling project? Would this potential deal see ASO lose the Saudi Tour? And what would it mean for the RCS-organised UAE Tour? So many questions, so much money flowing around, could someone lend me a tenner, please?
Elsewhere in the article, RCS CEO Paolo Bellino told the Italian publication the 2025 Albanian Grande Partenza is still going ahead, with Il Giornale reporting the route will now be unveiled on January 13. Do say: An annual Grande Partenza in Riyadh, what’s not to like? Don’t say: Show me the money!!!
Web design is my passion 💻
A fantastic spot by the Lanterne Rouge’s Luc Grefte, who clicked through from David Lappartient’s LinkedIn profile to his 2017 UCI presidency campaign website ourpassion.org and noticed it now takes you to an Indonesian poker website as he never renewed his domain. Or maybe Indonesian poker is now his passion? Yep, probably the latter.
🍾 Podium booze of the week 🍾
We somehow missed this on Monday, but a winter edition of Podium Chugging™️ took place at the Beking Monaco charity criterium, warming our cold heart and making us dream of warmer podium drinks. Your eponymous Amstel Golds, your Eschborn-Frankfurt Big Lager Boys. Soon the podium beers will return. Soon everything will be okay … well, unless the Saudi PIF ban podium chugging for good. But we’ll deal with that problem later.
Feed Zone 🥖
🤯 Along with cockroaches and second-hand copies of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, we have something else that will survive the nuclear apocalypse – Tom Pidcock transfer speculation. Yep, according to Gazzetta dello Sport, the deal for him to move to Q36.5 is still on the table: “We don’t say it’s 100 per cent done but the possibility still exists, news possibly coming in [the] next days,” the Italian paper reports.
🇨🇴 The 2025 Tour Colombia will not take place in February after losing the government funding that made the 2024 edition viable.
🙄 Pierre Baguette cycling rider Daniel Vysočan tested positive for EPO variant CERA two days prior to the U23 World Championships Road Race. The 20-year-old Czech rider is provisionally suspended pending analysis of his B-sample.
✍️ Maxim Van Gils and Lotto Dstny have officially reached an agreement to terminate the rider’s contract, the Belgian team announced. Van Gils’ new team is not yet known.
😔 Saint-Piran has announced it will not continue into 2025, meaning there will be no British men’s UCI Continental squads on the circuit next season.
🏍️ Police motorcycles will not be available for bike races in the Netherlands between January 1-August 31 next year, due to the NATO summit taking place in the Hague in June, which has thrown Dutch bike racing into chaos as to whether events will be able to go ahead as planned.
Cycling on TV 📺
Saturday November 30th
Track
UCI Track Champions League, Apeldoorn – Round 3
(10:00-14:00 ET/15:00-19:00 GMT/02:00-06:00 AEDT) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, Max 🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦, Staylive🇦🇺
Sunday December 1st
Cyclocross
UCI Cyclocross World Cup, Dublin – Women
(08:00-09:30 ET/13:00-14:30 GMT/00:00-01:30 AEDT) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, UCI’s YouTube🇺🇸🇨🇦🇦🇺
UCI Cyclocross World Cup, Dublin – Men
(09:30-11:00 ET/14:30-16:00 GMT/01:30-03:00 AEDT) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, UCI’s YouTube🇺🇸🇨🇦🇦🇺
Monday December 2nd
No live racing …
Convenient excuse of the week 🤔
“The battle between Froome and Contador on BKOOL is more than just a confrontation,” the BKOOL Twitter/X account breathlessly posted, “it is a legendary chapter that adds to their history of rivalry on the world’s great routes. Every pedal stroke today resonates with the intensity of the most epic moments of his career. The endless climbs, the unpredictable attacks, and the merciless fight between two titans that have marked an era.”
Yep, this week Chris Froome and Alberto Contador faced off virtually, in a ‘what could possibly go wrong’ moment for a current pro versus someone who’s been retired for seven years. “Chris Froome can’t even beat a retired Alberto Contador!” came the rather uncharitable headline from cyclinguptodate, and while the result of a virtual race even between two famous riders really does not matter in the slightest, we did enjoy Chris Froome making his excuses mid-race:
“Alberto seems to be particularly motivated today,” Froome said. “I did a four-hour training session this morning, so I prefer to take it easy and have a chat with you guys for a bit.”
So, El Pistolero still has that competitive mentality! Even when there is nothing at steak!
And finally …
Jack Burke has continued his quest to take the Strava KOMs of various mythical European climbs. Last week we brought you news the amateur with professional aspirations had set a new quickest time up the Mortirolo, before also beating Sepp Kuss’s time up Alpe d’Huez.
However, someone thought it would be funny to upload Marco Pantani’s 1995 Alpe d’Huez time onto the platform.
But to then take the time to upload a photo, profile picture and caption is a real commitment to the bit, which we have to applaud.
🧺 Send us yer laundry pics
“I recently discovered that the laundromat near my favorite local trails is Lidl-Trek themed (not actually, because this is Bremerton, WA, USA and no one here has ever heard of Lidl),” writes in chunkypeanutbutter on Discord. “Someone just genuinely liked this combo of primary colors and decided to paint their business accordingly.”
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 chunkypeanutbutter and Georgena Terry 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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