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Spin Cycle
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Hello!
Welcome back to Spin Cycle, Escape Collective’s news digest.
We have finally arrived in Nice for the final couple of stages at the 2024 Tour de France. Our waiter at tonight’s restaurant was the friendliest we’ve encountered since arriving in France from Italy, likely due to him being a massive cycling fan. He estimates he’s spotted Tadej Pogačar six or seven times while cycling on local roads around here, and also knows where Lenny Martinez lives. What a guy.
Pi-no to bull fighting
Having begun his retirement sinking beers with both Richard Plugge at ski resorts and at PSG Champions League games, Thibaut Pinot has found something else to do: campaign against the bull fighting that still takes place in Nîmes, which hosted the finish of the Tour de France’s stage 16 this year.
In an advert for PETA, Pinot posed, quite awkwardly it must be said, kind of making bull horns with his arms, making clear the difference between sport and torture, which, yeah, fair enough.
Slightly tangentially, seeing as we brought up Pinot’s penchant for the Parisian football team PSG, we heard a story that he’s a long-term season ticket holder. Not just that, he sits with the ultras, who in their home stadium sit in a specific area of the ground which is referred to, based on its curved shape, as a virage! Turns out, virage Pinot is just a way of life.
Gassed to be in China
By no means are we trying to become the Gas Police but in the aftermath of the carbon monoxide article we were sent this image of Romanian Continental rider Cristian Raileanu’s Instagram story.
To lay people, any photo of medical equipment is alarming, so we messaged Raileanu to check if he was okay and what was going on. Turned out he was absolutely fine and at the Tour of Qinghai Lake and with the race being at 3,000-4,000 metres of altitude, the UCI allows riders to use oxygen. This is available for any team who wants it, Raileanu goes on to explain. It’s a fun little factoid we weren’t previously aware of! As for that crudely PhotoShopped “CO2” graphic got pasted on top? That’s not even the right gas, people.
Willie Smit, who was also at the race, added a couple of things he learned from racing above 4,000 metres: “Air density is low so the average speeds are very high. These altitudes dehydrates you unbelievably quickly.”
Spotted at the Tour 👀
Ineos Gren-oh-dear (oh dear oh dear)
Descending the Plateau de Beille post-stage, the official race evacuation for accredited Tour de France vehicles (teams, media and partners) can often be an arduous and lengthy process, as larger vehicles twist and turndown the mountain roads.
What we didn’t expect to see, especially from a Built-On-Purpose Ineos Grenadier, was for it to need a three-point to navigate a hairpin. Not very maximal gains at all!
A blast from the recent past
Another evacuation, this time from Isola 2000, someone on a Brompton ahead of us was hurtling down the descent, wobbling through the tunnel. This was very concerning. We were travelling at quite a (legal) speed in a convoy (that isn’t all that inclined to stopping) and were worried he could slip and meet us at any moment.
But then, we realised it was former Team Sky domestique Peter Kennaugh, currently working for British broadcaster ITV at the Tour. In a bygone era he would lead the professional peloton up these mountains and now he descends them wearing socks from the OBEY streetwear brand and riding an expensive travel bike. Once we realised it was him, our worries disappeared, he knew what he was doing. We even saw him do a sort-of super tuck on a straight …
Feed Zone 🥖
🇪🇸 Spain’s Oier Lazkano has replaced Juan Ayuso in the Olympic time trial (July 27) as the latter recovers from the bout of COVID-19 that forced him to abandon the Tour de France. Ayuso is still planning on racing the road race on August 3.
😡 The UCI Ethics Commission has provisionally suspended Gert Vervoort, the team leader of the Continental women’s team Proximus-Cyclis, with a press release stating he faces “accusations of inappropriate behaviour of a psychological and sexual nature.”
🇸🇮 Urška Žigart has spoken out about her non-selection for Slovenia’s national team for the upcoming Olympic Games: “I don’t have to prove myself to anyone. The national coach looks at my results in one-day races and much less at my role during the race. I often ride in the service of others. That was also the case in Liège-Bastogne-Liège, for example, where I came 32nd. I think he was looking for a reason not to select me.”
🦵 Thibau Nys (Lidl-Trek) has to pass on next week’s Tour de Wallonie due to knee issues.
💸 Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe boss Ralph Denk confirmed to Wielerflits that Max Schachmann will be leaving the team at the end of the season. “Max is ready for a change,” he said.
🔀 The boys over at Wielerflits also have some Soudal-Quick Step rumours, saying Uno-X Mobility are currently after Kasper Asgreen’s services, while Julian Alaphilippe’s agent has apparently offered his rider to Q36.5 to join the fray alongside Cofidis and TotalEnergies as Quick-Step considers retaining the two-time world champion.
🌱 Soudal-Quick Step will start its own junior team in 2025, Het Nieuwsblad reports.
Cycling on TV 📺
Saturday July 20th
Tour de France – Stage 20
(07:05-11:30 ET/12:05-16:30 BST/21:05-01:30 AEST) ITV/Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, NBC/Peacock🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦, SBS🇦🇺
Sunday July 21st
Tour de France – Stage 21
(06:35-11:00 ET/11:35-16:00 BST/20:35-01:00 AEST) ITV/Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, NBC/Peacock🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦, SBS🇦🇺
Monday July 22nd
Tour of Wallonie – Stage 1
(07:15-11:40 ET/12:15-16:40 BST/21:15-01:40 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, FloBikes🇨🇦
Tuesday July 23rd
Tour of Wallonie – Stage 2
(06:45-11:30 ET/11:45-16:30 BST/20:45-01:30 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, Max 🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦
Wednesday July 24th
Tour of Wallonie – Stage 3
(06:30-11:10 ET/11:30-16:10 BST/20:30-01:10 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, Max 🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦
Thursday July 25th
Tour of Wallonie – Stage 4
(06:30-11:00 ET/11:30-16:00 BST/20:30-01:00 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, Max 🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦
Czech Tour – Stage 1
(07:00-10:30 ET/12:00-15:30 BST/21:00-00:30 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, FloBikes🇨🇦
Friday July 26th
Tour of Wallonie – Stage 5
(06:45-11:30 ET/11:45-16:30 BST/20:45-01:30 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, Max 🇺🇸, FloBikes🇨🇦
Czech Tour – Stage 2
(07:00-11:30 ET/12:00-16:30 BST/21:00-01:30 AEST) Eurosport/Discovery+🇬🇧, FloBikes🇨🇦
😐 Olympic mugshots of the week 😐
We’re going to let this one speak for itself. Simply can’t get enough of the Olympic security headshot photos. We hope we have more to bring you next week too.
And finally …
Meanwhile, in the real world, a Crowdstrike crashed Microsoft Windows caused global chaos. No-one at the Tour de France realised, however, mostly because the race is still run using pen and paper.
You can imagine the pandemonium that may have erupted in the Visma-Lease a Bike control room, however.
👋 See ya in a week
We’ll be having a few days off to recover from the Tour de France (it was so, so hard eating our body weight in pastries and watching the race up close) so will next arrive in your inboxes on Friday July 26th.
🧺 Send us yer laundry pics
“My tour of Intermarché laundromats continues!” writes David Campbell, attaching today’s featured laundromat. “This is Barcelonnette, where stage 18 ends.”
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 David Campbell for contributions to today’s edition and a big thank you to all of you who have signed up already as Escape Collective founding 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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