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.
Can you hear that? It’s the return of WorldTour racing rumbling closer. Soon, everything will be back to how it should be. Road races on many days of the week, transporting you around the world in a whirl of Lycra, rubber and scenic backdrops. We can’t wait.
In the meantime, one rider likely to dominate once again this year has been drawing on some extra motivation in training …
How to motivate the man who’s won it all 💪
This is a fun spot by Lucas Ronald, who noticed that while UAE Team Emirates had replaced the audio on a video of Tadej Pogačar out training with music (although if you listen closely you can just about hear the original audio beneath) the automatic closed captions were still picking up the original audio.
So, what do UAE Team Emirates coaches shout at the Slovenian as encouragement during an effort?
“Vingegaard close to win! And Remco, they drop you!”
It’s fun to know the big guns use the mere idea of their rivals to motivate them during training many months away from going head-to-head. We are officially excited for the Tour de France. Yes, we know it’s January.
Fun police 👮♂️
Don’t worry everyone! The UCI has a new rule to solve safety in cycling! What is it? Oh, you know those fun images of a rider crossing the line with their arms aloft and their teammate in the background also sitting up celebrating? Yeah, not allowed to do that anymore.
So, scenes like below where Mathias Vacek (we’re pretty sure) can be seen in the background on the right celebrating as his Lidl-Trek teammate Mads Pedersen takes the win will be a relic from this point on.
To quote The Office [US] character Andy Bernard: “I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”
Feed Zone 🥖
🐺 Who had the second week of January on their bingo card as the week we begin discussing Remco Evenepoel’s contract? Soudal-Quick Step CEO Jurgen Foré, who when speaking at the team presentation this week doesn’t seem stressed that his star rider’s current deal runs out at the end of 2026. “Not everyone can do that,” Foré said in relation to UAE Team Emirates handing Pogačar a seven-year deal until the end of 2030. However, Quick-Step have scrimped together the cash to keep Tim Merlier until the end of 2028 when the sprinter will be 36.
🇦🇺 Caleb Ewan’s future is up in the air as he’s not been present at early-season races in Australia and been removed from the squad page on the Jayco-AlUla website. We have more on the story here.
Cycling on TV 📺
Saturday January 11th
No live racing …
Sunday January 12th
Cyclocross
French National Cyclocross Championships – Elite Men
(09:20-10:40 ET/14:20-15:40 GMT/01:20-02:40 AEDT) Eurosport/Discovery🇬🇧
Monday January 13th
No live racing …
🙊🙉🙈 The planet is burning and this isn’t helping of the week 🙊🙉🙈
Look, we get it. We still need oil and gas and whatever to help run our cars, heat our homes, all that stuff. Using it probably makes us slight hypocrites when criticising the countries producing the things we willingly buy.
But there is a line to be crossed, and UAE Team Emirates-XRG proudly announcing in a press release this week that the team hit their carbon neutrality milestones for 2022 and 2023 rings a little hollow.
“At UAE Team Emirates XRG, sustainability isn’t just a commitment—it’s a journey we embark on every season,” the press release reads. “With every race, every kilometer traveled, and every innovation adopted, we are determined to reduce our emissions year after year.
“Our mission is clear: calculate our carbon footprint annually, take decisive action to minimize it, and inspire change within our global community.”
But not too much change, of course, as 85% of the UAE’s economy is made up of its oil exports, which in turn funds the team itself through various national companies.
The whole thing is essentially a carbon-offsetting programme, which some have argued is worthless and other scientists claim is “actively dangerous.”
“Since day one, our team’s mission has been about more than just winning bike races,” says team boss Mauro Gianetti on the squad’s ‘road to net-zero‘ web page. “We were created to become a vehicle for change. Along with the support from our partners, we have committed to driving positive social impact.”
Do say: UAE, vehicle for environmental change. Don’t say: Ah, so this is what being gaslit feels like!
And finally …
We enjoy keeping up with what pro riders get up to after they finish racing. Claudio Imhof’s desire to become a train driver, Thibaut Pinot’s ongoing delayed gap year climbing mountains and drinking Multiple Beers.
Add to this Jelle Wallays, retired for a year; he’s clearly itching to get back on the bike as he’s planning a 15,000 km, 100-day ride around the western coastline of Europe. Looks fun and tiring. We’ll be following along for sure.
Clarifications cul de sac 🏘️
“That’s not a fan Wout van Aert is hugging,” writes in Adam Myerson (a fixture of the US scene and former member of the UCI cyclocross commission) about Monday’s newsletter. “It’s Chris Mannaerts, the director of cyclocross for Flanders Classics. The guy who runs the World Cup.
“Also,” he continues. “They don’t let the riders wipe their faces before their interviews if possible. It’s intentional.”
🧺 Send us yer laundry pics
“In honour of the Australian National Road champs being held in Ben O’Connor and Jai Hindley’s birthplace of Perth this weekend (for the first time in 28 years), I felt it was apropos to send in a laundromat pic from just by the course,” writes in Will Partridge, attaching today’s featured laundromat.
“This bland (and expensive) laundromat is one block away from the University of Western Australia, and just down the road from the long riverside drag, along which the riders will undoubtedly enjoy the unending smell of rotten eggs which the river constantly gives off.”
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 Adam Myerson and Will Partridge 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
Enter your email address to get our unique spin on news from the world of cycling delivered directly to your inbox!
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