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Hello!
Welcome back to Spin Cycle, Escape Collective’s news digest.
Let us be yet another email landing in your inbox this Christmas Day that wishes you a Merry Christmas! But instead of trying to upsell you or promote brand awareness based on hollow season’s greetings, we’d rather you join us on a journey recapping the weird and wonderful 2024 cycling season.
Thanks to the accomplishments of modern technology, you are receiving this message from the past, the week before Christmas to be exact. So, if any Earth-shattering news has dropped in the meantime, that’s the reason we are so calm. Don’t worry, if Tom Pidcock has switched teams yet again be safe in the knowledge that we are suitably freaking out, just while sitting on the sofa drinking mulled wine.
What follows is an alternative bumper (and we mean BUMPER) review of the year that’s been, so feel free to portion it out and digest it in chunks, locking yourself in the bathroom for five minutes of peace here and there. The hyperlinks will whisk you off to any of the individual stories or videos you wish to refresh your memory on. One thing is for sure, it’s been quite the year!
We hope you have a Merry Christmas, and understand that this time of year can be difficult instead of fun. Whoever you are, wherever you are, know that you are loved and thank you for being a part of this oddball community-within-a-community. Whether that means you’ve sent us in a correction, laundry photo, or simply quietly read along for the past year. Thanks for being along for the ride.
January: Pints with Plugge and a gold Lamborghini spitoon 🍺
World champion Mathieu van der Poel began the year by spitting at fans who’d been jeering him before driving off in a gold Lamborghini, which is quite the combination. Online cycling retailer Wiggle went into administration and amongst the suppliers it owed money to is Haribo, who had an outstanding bill of £20,000. Uno-X Mobility’s Anders Halland Johannessen and Jonas Hvideberg were hospitalised with go-karting induced carbon monoxide poisoning [Jan 5th].
Richard Plugge and Thibaut Pinot snapped a selfie of them having a beer together at the Alpine ski resort of Tignes, which gave the victory in the ‘100 beer war’ to the Visma-Lease a Bike boss over his Groupama-FDJ nemesis Marc Madiot. Plugge also continued to push his One Cycling project (which we covered later, in June), despite grumbles from other teams that the then-current AIGCP president should be focusing on representing all of the teams’ best interests rather than scheming up breakaway competitions. Ultra cyclist Omar De Felice made it an astonishing halfway to the South Pole by bike before being forced to turn abandon his challenge, stretching the boundaries of what is possible to do on a bicycle [Jan 8th].
David Gaudu said he was spending too much time on the internet and that was the reason for his poor 2023 season, so replaced that hobby with fishing [Jan 12th]. The Financial Times reported Australian political strategist Isaac Levido is a massive Wout van Aert fan, Primoź Roglič began to have an impact at new team Bora-Hansgrohe by reducing the number of salads being put on offer by team chefs. Geraint Thomas asked for peoples’ thoughts on the latest film-to-not-watch-with-your-family Saltburn [Jan 15th].
20-year-old Isaac del Toro’s big takeaway from his day in the leader’s jersey at the Tour Down Under was his sighting of three kangaroos at the side of the road. The Big Three of Wout van Aert, Van der Poel and Pidcock did their best impressions of Brits abroad staggering to their hotels after a zillion warm lager beers at the Benidorm round of the UCI Cyclocross World Cup, stumbling their way around the coastal course. A TV interviewer incorrectly told Oscar Onley he was in the race lead of the Tour Down Under, when in actual fact Stevie Williams had pipped him on countback [Jan 22nd].
February: Denk’s mountain sausage emporium 🌭
Farmers protested policy changes by putting up a roadblock on the course of Etoile de Bessèges, while two other Frenchmen were arrested for making a habit of pushing cyclists off their bikes in rural southwest France.
After the Tour of Britain and Women’s Tour were ominously missing from the UCI calendar following a financial dispute with organiser SweetSpot, it emerged the races would go ahead as revamped-but-slimmed-down men’s and women’s Tours of Britain. Red Bull’s purchase of 51% of Bora-Hansgrohe was approved by the Austrian Competition Authority. US authorities revealed they caught Kaitlin Armstrong (who murdered gravel racer Mo Wilson and then went on the run for 43 days) by posting a job ad seeking a yoga instructor in Costa Rica, where Armstrong had fled using her sister’s passport. A certified yoga instructor, Armstrong got in touch to say she was interested and was then arrested [Feb 2nd].
Reuters reported Saudi Arabia is primed to chuck €250 million at Plugge’s OneCycling project, damning texts surfaced in the Miguel Ángel López doping case, the UCI suspended Decathlon-Ag2r La Mondiale’s Franck Bonnamour for biological passport anomalies registered before he joined the French team. As increasing numbers of sports fans look to take home a memento by holding up signs begging for shirts from athletes, two cyclocross fans simply asked Mathieu van der Poel to spit on them too [Feb 5th].
Mark Cavendish began his season over at Tour Colombia in high spirits, handing out high-fives and selfies to anyone who wanted one. Bora boss Ralph Denk shared his vision for a OneCycling mountain sausage emporium, saying cycling should charge fans €5 or €10 to watch Grand Tour stages in the high mountains, while also proposing a combo deal including a beer and a sausage for €25. Very specific. Fernando Gaviria unveiled a supremely impressive moustache [Feb 9th].
Aleksandr Vlasov refused to view Primoź Roglič as the new out-and-out leader at Bora-Hansgrohe, saying the road would decide who was team leader at the next month’s Paris-Nice [Feb 12th], while Sepp Kuss truthers received extra ammunition after a Visma-Lease a Bike press release declared the American “proved his worth” with sixth place in the Clásica Jaén. Oier Lazkano won that race and got a giant golden olive trophy. The five-day Ruta del Sol was reduced to just a 5 km time trial after a farmer protest brought the race to a halt. We got our first ruinous early celebration of the year courtesy of Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) at the Classic Var. Alpecin-Deceuninck revealed its belated new kit for 2024, which looked an awful lot like Soudal-Quick Step’s strip [Feb 16th].
Nacer Bouhanni announced he’d like to try out acting, something made more feasible by his long-term girlfriend being nominated for a César (the French Oscars). Geraint Thomas officially reached old man status by declaring there wasn’t any respect in the peloton anymore [Feb 19th].
Peter Sagan had an operation for heart arrhythmia, Marion Rousse called out Patrick Lefevere for his latest verbal tirade against her partner Julian Alaphilippe, with Philippe Gilbert’s wife Bettina weirdly jumping in to defend Lefevere. At the pre-Opening Weekend press conference, Lefevere told the media not to ask Alaphilippe any questions about the drama. With that being the only thing reporters were interested in asking about, Het Nieuwsblad’s journalist reported the rest of the press conference “collapsed like a pudding.” The truck driver who killed Davide Rebellin was jailed for three years and 11 months, Victor Campenaerts launched an all-time email acquisition play by telling people if they returned clothes he discarded during Omloop Het Nieuwsblad via an email address stitched into the labels, at the end of the season they would get a free coffee and signed jersey [Feb 23rd].
March: Aer-no TT helmets and a dash of hypocris(k)y 😮
Tadej Pogačar won Strade emphatically, while some dude taking a photo on his phone ruined the TV shot for Kopecky’s victory in the Piazza del Campo. Tom Pidcock responded to Pogačar’s victory: “I don’t know what to say, to be honest. Just … what the fuck?” [Mar 4th]
130 completely innocent amateur riders abandoned a race with anti-doping waiting at the finish line. The UCI announced it would be investigating Visma-Lease a Bike’s new oddly-shaped time trial helmets, while the governing body also banned the Specialized head sock. Primoź Roglič said he still found himself instinctively following Visma-Lease a Bike wheels, forgetting he was now on a different team, Peter Sagan started riding for the fabulously-named Pierre Baguette Cycling in his mathematically-impossible quest for an Olympic mountain bike spot [Mar 8th].
Matteo Jorgenson and Jonas Vingegaard sealed victories at Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico, a worrying sign that Visma’s dominance was set to continue into 2024 [Mar 11th].
Rod Ellingworth found a new job as race director of the men’s and women’s Tours of Britain. The UCI found Patrick Lefevere’s “public comments considered as disparaging towards women” breached two articles of its Code of Ethics. His punishment was a forced public apology and a $22,000 fine suspended for three years pending he says nothing else that’s sexist in that time [Mar 15th].
Reacting to a small bout of fisticuffs between Wout Poels and Nairo Quintana at the Volta a Catalunya, Geraint Thomas seemed to forget every single grey area Team Sky have exploited over the past decade to decidedly declare that Quintana’s Tramadol positive means he “shouldn’t even be racing” on his Watts Occurring podcast, before Luke Rowe called the Colombian a “little f**king rat”, which isn’t very nice at all. Wout van Aert broke his collarbone and ribs in a crash at Dwars door Vlaanderen, ruling him out of Flanders and Roubaix. Tadej Pogačar hid in the bushes at the Volta a Catalunya and let the peloton go past to trick them into thinking he’d vanished up the road [Mar 27th].
April: Lasagna is the cure 💆♂️
While Mathieu van der Poel stomped all over the Tour of Flanders, one fan’s slightly odd “Désolé Marion” TV proposal left many questions unanswered until the great and the good of the EC community unpicked the mystery. Primoź Roglič managed to win the opening TT of the Tour of the Basque Country despite going the wrong way [Apr 1st] before Jonas Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel and Roglič were involved in a serious crash at the stage race. Visma-Lease a Bike sports director Merijn Zeeman announced he’d be leaving the team at the end of the season for the bright lights of football, getting a job at Dutch team AZ Alkmaar, Michael Rogers innovated himself out of his role as head of innovation and e-sport at the UCI by handing in his notice [Apr 5th].
Cap-gate erupted at Paris-Roubaix, after a woman chucked a hat at Mathieu van der Poel’s rear wheel before the Dutchman improved on his previous Alpecin shampoo/Roubaix shower sponsor activation by bringing two different bottles of Alpecin shampoo in with him to wash in front of the cameras. A Bolivian man wearing a Nairo Quintana Movistar Vuelta red jersey was arrested by police for being found in possession of €3.5 million worth of marijuana [Apr 8th].
Ineos owner Jim Ratcliffe implored the UCI to improve cycling safety, which is a good thing, but weirdly used the examples of Chris Froome’s pre-Dauphiné stage and Egan Bernal’s training ride crashes to back up his point. Not sure what the UCI is supposed to do to prevent those incidents. The UCI hired a former Homeland Security employee as its new, catchily-named ‘Head of the Fight Against Technological Fraud.’ Arkéa-B&B Hotels was forced to apologise to bike sponsor Bianchi after its rider Florian Sénéchal criticised the brand following four bike changes at Paris-Roubaix. Bianchi said specific instructions for the assembly of the bikes’ handlebars had been ignored [Apr 12th].
At the Amstel Gold Race, Tom Pidcock didn’t enjoy his podium beer whereas Tiesj Benoot wolfed his down, while in the women’s race Lorena Wiebes joined the early celebration club as Marianne Vos pipped her to victory at the last [Apr 15th].
Spin Cycle somehow reached its 100th edition without getting shut down, Michał Kwiatkowski described a torrential edition of Flèche Wallonne as feeling like downing three shots of vodka on an empty stomach, and the G7 Foreign Ministers posed with Giro d’Italia pink jerseys at a meeting in Italy [Apr 19th].
Tom Pidcock collected his MBE 27 months after being awarded it on the New Year Honours List. Patrick Lefevere played more mind games by suggesting Julian Alaphilippe could yet sign a new contract to stay at Soudal-Quick Step, while Isaac del Toro signed a deal with UAE Team Emirates to keep him there until 2029 [Apr 26th].
A different Frank van den Broek won stage 6 of the Tour of Turkey, Patrick Lefevere revealed he missed his first Paris-Roubaix in decades due to illness and decided to cure himself by eating a lasagna and watching the race on the TV instead. At the Vuelta Feminina TTT, Visma-Lease a Bike’s helmets continued to look ridiculous [Apr 29th].
May: Absolutely plastered 🤪
Oliver Naesen and Stan Dewulf were tucked up in bed the night before Eschborn-Frankfurt when a huge piece of plaster came crashing down from the ceiling of their hotel room. “I was scared to death,” Naesen told Het Nieuwsblad afterwards, while Remco Evenepoel sadly outed himself as a massive Gooner, because no one’s perfect [May 3rd].
Arnaud De Lie won Tro Bro Léon and thanks to a bet with the organisers was awarded a pig despite not being a Breton rider. At the side of the road during the race, Groupama-FDJ boss Marc Madiot refused to give a bottle to a 21-year-old Euskaltel-Euskadi rider. Tadej Pogačar took the maglia rosa at the Giro d’Italia and responded to whether his early exertions would cost him in his Giro/Tour double attempt with: “So far I haven’t spent any Euros. I’m on a paid holiday since six days.” [May 7th]
On a state visit to France, Chinese President Xi Jinping was gifted a yellow jersey by his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron as the pair visited the Col du Tourmalet. Jonas Vingegaard moved into a new gaff that’s half acceptable Scandi vibes/half menacing Tony Soprano New Jersey chic. The Maryland Classic was cancelled due to the Baltimore bridge collapse. Patrick Lefevere stood at the side of the road at the Giro to hand a bottle to Alaphilippe in his latest PR move. The UCI U-turned over trying to ban Pogačar’s maglia rosa purple shorts worn to commemorate an air disaster [May 10th].
Pogačar’s agent Alex Carera revealed the Slovenian had a beer the night before he won the final stage of Volta a Catalunya and sealed the overall, Lilian Calmejane had a sleepless night during the Giro after his dog, Pato, went missing back home [May 13th].
The trailer for season two of Netflix’s Tour de France: Unchained dropped, featuring Julian Alaphilippe being asked how much he gets paid. “Too much for Patrick,” the Frenchman responded. Jonathan Milan summoned the patience of a saint as he was waiting for a replacement wheel following a puncture when a fan ran out to grab a selfie with the Italian mid-Giro stage [May 17th].
Finally back out on a bike following his Basque Country crash, Jonas Vingegaard proudly displayed a new butterfly tattoo he must have had inked during his time off. Bora DS Rolf Aldag revealed his colleague Enrico Gasparotto won’t let Bahrain Victorious cat-sniper Antonio Tiberi draft behind his car when chasing back to the bunch because he’s a big fan of cats. A dumb-dumb British broadsheet newspaper declared cyclists are turning UK roads into death traps by riding 52 mph in a 20 mph zone, which if so should get them in the summer’s Olympic squad. Tadej Pogačar said he used to enjoy watching Chris Froome and Nairo Quintana racing when growing up but always used to get frustrated with Quintana because he attacked too late. Strong words from Lidl-Trek’s Thibau Nys after winning the Tour of Hungary: “Sprinters are arseholes. I don’t want to be associated with it. What happens in a sprint is sometimes criminal. Literally criminal.” [May 20th]
Tadej Pogačar proved so dominant at the Giro d’Italia that his detractors began flagging his Strava uploads of each day’s stage. At an amateur race in France, an actor called Giovambattista Iera was suspected of riding with a hidden motor and when the race organiser tried to stop him leaving Iera dragged him down down the road for 300 metres on his car bonnet. Iera is a co-owner of restaurant chain Italian Trattoria, which is a sponsor of all-round ethical guy Alexandre Vinokourov’s Astana-Qazaqstan team. Taco Van der Hoorn completed his first ride outside 14 months after suffering a serious concussion in a crash. British Cycling brought in Lloyds Bank to sponsor the national body and the Tours of Britain [May 24th].
Nathan Van Hooydonck came to the UK to work on the Discovery+ Giro d’Italia TV coverage and was introduced to what a Wetherspoons is. Tadej Pogačar wrapped up six Giro stage wins and a maglia rosa by saying it was a shame UAE Team Emirates couldn’t win the final stage 21 with sprinter Juan Sebastián Molano. Unbound Gravel issued a decree that competitors could not bend, fold, cut or wrap their number plates in search of aero gains. Slovenian motorways celebrated their home rider’s Giro victory by putting up anti-speeding signs that read “leave the racing to Pogačar.” [May 27th]
There was a bit of a weird one at the women’s Ruta del Sol, when race organisers began adding riders from Guinea Bissau’s team and the given names matched UCI licences of male athletes. The team went quiet on the organisers and didn’t turn up for the start in Spain. American basketball and cycling legend Bill Walton sadly passed away at the age of 71. Jan Ullrich opened his own eponymous museum in Bad Dürrheim, Germany, open Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Miguel Ángel López was handed a four-year suspension for being found guilty of doping with the hormonal drug Menotropin at the 2022 Giro d’Italia. Fresh off retiring at Rund um Köln, Rick Zabel rode 600 km from Germany to London to watch Borussia Dortmund take on Real Madrid in the Champions League final. Charles Leclerc summoned up some Big Yves Lampaert Energy and rode home after winning the Monaco Grand Prix [May 31st].
June: Y’all are unhinged, putting pensioners in hostage videos 📹
Season two of Netflix’s Unchained provided a lot of juice, from Richard Plugge saying he started the 100 Beer War with Marc Madiot to deflect from people questioning Jonas Vingegaard’s dominant TT performance, to the Pidcock/Cummings drama. Lachlan Morton won Unbound 200, as gravel rainbow jersey holder Matej Mohorič DNFed following punctures and mechanical issues. Footballer Eden Hazard rode up Mont Ventoux in Intermarché-Wanty kit [June 4th].
Laurens ten Dam and Thomas Dekker were arrested for getting changed in the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant in Oklahoma. The pair spent 10 hours in jail before posting bail and making it to the Unbound start line in time. Road.cc posted a phenomenal video of Ineos Grenadiers’ attempts to stop them filming the new unreleased Pinarello sat atop their race cars parked up on public roads [June 7th].
The French cycling union offered Roubaix hat woman a deal for her to avoid being charged with intended assault and battery if she admits wrongdoing, admits she threw the hat and volunteers for the Amis de Paris-Roubaix next year, and becomes the public face of a campaign to promote safe fan behaviour. French President Emmanuel Macron called a snap general election that would coincide with the Tour de France. Bradley Wiggins was declared bankrupt by a UK court, with Wiggins calling it “a historical issue where the negligence of others has left a big pile of shit with my name on it.” Primoź Roglič wins the Criterium du Dauphiné. Christine Majerus contracts early celebration-itis [June 10th].
Peter Sagan won a financial trading competition hosted by a company called FlowBank, beating boxer Anthony Joshua and Formula 1’s Esteban Ocon. The very next day, the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) opened bankruptcy proceedings against the crypto-linked business [June 14th].
Gordon Ramsay showed off a crazy bruise on his torso following a bike accident, UAE Team Emirates duo Adam Yates and João Almeida finished 1-2 at the Tour de Suisse, and Mark Cavendish was awarded a knighthood in King Charles’ birthday honours [June 17th].
“Y’all are unhinged wtf,” was Matteo Jorgenson’s response to Wielerflits’ suggestion Jonas Vingegaard could work for the American’s chances if the Dane arrived at the Tour not-quite-recovered. Olympic track medalist Katie Archibald dislocated her ankle, broke her tibia and fibula, and ripped two ligaments off the bone in a freak accident tripping on a step in her garden at home. Defending Olympic road race champion Richard Carapaz missed out on selection in favour of Jhonatan Narváez. Bruno Armirail prepared for the French national time trial championships by wearing boxers depicting the Raving Rabbids video game series (or in French, Lapins Crétins). He won the title [June 21st].
National Championship weekend saw bizarre pelotons featuring dozens of riders wearing the same trade jersey. EF Education-EasyPost fired Andrea Piccolo after he was reportedly stopped at an airport and found to be in possession of Human Growth Hormone. Big Snogger David Gaudu tested positive for COVID-19 a week before the start of the Tour de France (can’t blame that on the internet). Italian pensioner Renato Favero was forced into making a hostage-style apology video for touching Tadej Pogačar on the Monte Grappa at May’s Giro, taking the deal to avoid any legal trouble if he pleads on tape for others to not do as he did. Tom Pidcock’s dogs joined him on the Crans-Montana mountain bike podium. [June 24th]
Visma-Lease a bike rock up to the Tour de France with a control room situated inside of a van with the idea to collect data mid-race. Within days the UCI had banned it from the race. The Dutch team’s latest barf-worthy Tour de France branding includes the slogan ‘beyond victory.’ Performance Engineer Dan Bigham announced he was leaving Ineos Grenadiers at the end of the season. Bora-Hansgrohe became Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe with a great new kit to boot. To go with his butterfly tattoo, Jonas Vingegaard is spotted at the pre-Tour de France press conference sporting a Paw Patrol tattoo on his hand (this one was temporary) [June 28th].
July: Smashed teeth and smushed foxes 🦊
Jan Hirt smashed his front teeth up after colliding with a fan’s backpack following stage 1 of the Tour de France [July 1st]. Ahead of the Florence Grand Départ, teams were invited to a sustainability meeting scheduled long enough after the team managers’ meeting that everyone drove back to their hotels for a half hour break in between. Only eight teams appeared in person, with the petro-thruple of Ineos Grenadiers, UAE and TotalEnergies Zoom-ing into the call virtually, an option that had not been made available to others. EF Education-EasyPost proudly (and lately) declared via email that Richard Carapaz had taken the yellow jersey, and six minutes after the e-mail was sent he was dropped like a stone on the Galibier. Visma-Lease a Bike were spotted still using Jumbo plastic bags, which was actually the most sustainable thing we saw happening at the Tour [July 5th].
Astana Qazaqstan celebrated Mark Cavendish making history by stepping in a smushed fox on the floor outside their team bus. Marc Madiot and Groupama-FDJ auctioned off the chance to join them for a meal at their team hotel mid-Tour de France, and despite “expert” estimates of the price being between €1k-€2k, the sale attracted five bids and eventually sold for €450 [July 8th].
Over at Romania’s Sibiu Tour, a family of bears got their hands on VolkerWessels’ bags, while back at the Tour NBC’s Steve Porino got in a hot tub AKA le man soup with a bunch of French fans at the roadside. A spectator who threw crisps at Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard was taken into police custody [July 15th].
On the descent off the Plateau de Beille, we watched an Ineos Grenadier three-point turn around a standard hairpin, holding up traffic, before Peter Kennaugh whizzed past on a Brompton. Thibaut Pinot sipped Tourtels and Lime biked around Nice. Tadej Pogačar won the Tour de France. Striking security headshots for Olympic athletes started emerged [July 19th].
Pogačar ruled himself out of the 2024 Olympics, saying he needed rest but that also his partner Urška Žigart’s omission from the Slovenian women’s squad “didn’t help.” Guillaume Martin cast a dejected figure when explaining how his bike was 1 kg heavier than his Tour rivals, and was the reason he rode without a power meter, which would add even more weight, and caused Cofidis to release a statement saying: “The Cofidis team affirms its total confidence in Look and Corima.” Mark Cavendish looked overjoyed that he was being dragged on to morning chat shows in the UK post-Tour [July 26th].
August: Supermarket sweep for T-Rex onion feet 🦖
Alexandre Vinokourov rode the Paris Olympic road race course on a gold bike and in his Gran Fondo (50-54 year old category) World Champion rainbow jersey, having also just signed a new sponsorship deal for Astana Qazaqstan with Chinese bike manufacturer XDS. Some guys have all the luck. Ben O’Connor deleted Duolingo off of his phone after securing a transfer away from Decathlon-Ag2r La Mondiale to Jayco-AlUla. Jay Vine returned to racing four months after his Basque Country crash and promptly took a win [August 2nd].
Remco Evenepoel scooped both Olympic road cycling gold medals before dancing the night away at the Belgian House, his road race victory having been announced over the tannoy during a Belgian Pro League football match causing cheers to go up inside the stadium. Nils Politt was just thankful to have found a brasserie to dash into mid-race to relieve himself. This wasn’t just any brasserie, but the one used in Amélie [August 5th].
Dutch people were stealing Tour de France signs ahead of the women’s Tour arriving in their country, Nils Politt revealed on a podcast that his UAE Team Emirates have a “blacklist” on the bus featuring riders Pogačar and Co are not exactly fond of. Eritrea went bonkers celebrating the return of Tour de France green jersey Biniam Girmay [August 9th].
Jim Ratcliffe bought up 6% of Iceland to protect Atlantic salmon for around the same cost as a year’s funding for Ineos Grenadiers. American mountain bike champion Bjorn Riley had to be evacuated by helicopter in Andorra after being bitten by an adder [August 12th].
Soudal-Quick Step did a big sponsorship activation of Soudal’s T-Rex range of sealants by bringing an inflatable dinosaur costume with a person inside to the Vuelta a España, a stunt they would later win a sponsorship activation award for at the Belgian Sponsorship Awards. Rod Ellingworth announced he was heading back into team management at Bahrain Victorious. David Gaudu showed off his new man bun [August 16th].
The Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift concluded with a thrilling finale up Alpe d’Huez, Julian Alaphilippe signed a presumably monster contract with Fabian Cancellara’s Tudor Pro Cycling, UAE Team Emirates were fined €4,000 by the UCI for wearing a special jersey with splashes of pink and yellow to celebrate their Giro and Tour victories at the Vuelta team presentation. Ineos Grenadiers’ Leo Hayter opened up about his struggles with depression, anxiety, and eating disorders and deciding to put his cycling career on hold in an impressively brave and candid blog post. Jonas Vingegaard received a great hat and a swig of champagne for winning the Tour of Poland [August 19th].
Decathlon-Ag2r La Mondiale gave the old heave ho to long-time boss Vincent Lavenu. Michel Hessman’s lawyers reached a settlement with WADA over his positive test for a banned diuretic, which will allow the German to return to competition in March 2025 despite Visma-Lease a Bike deciding not to renew the German’s contract. Multiple Paris Olympics track cycling medalist Matthew Richardson announced a switch of allegiance from Australia to Great Britain [August 23rd].
Stage six of the Vuelta started inside a Carrefour supermarket, causing awkward times for Lidl-Trek who have their own rival supermarket rule, but then got stuck into the Lidl-sponsored Deutschland Tour by sweeping all five stages and the overall. Back at the Vuelta Giulio Ciccone crashed after being hit by a deer [August 26th].
Lotto-Dstny’s Lennert van Eetvelt was video’d strapping onions to his feet to help with inflammation. Ben O’Connor deleted his Twitter account after he sent a series of tweets criticising the race jury for handing his Decathlon-Ag2r La Mondiale the sport’s first-ever yellow card for blocking the road on stage 11. Geraint Thomas bunkered down at an all-inclusive hotel in Mallorca and spent his time “drinking quite a lot of alcohol” ahead of an unwanted trip to the Renewi Tour [August 30th].
September: Disneyland or OnlyFans ✨
A bee chased UAE Team Emirates around the sign-on stage at the Vuelta [September 2nd], Ben O’Connor was fined €1,100 for “failure to attend official ceremonies or failing to respect the 10-minute deadline after the rider crosses the line” after accidentally descending 15 km down from the summit finish not knowing the Vuelta podium would take place at the top, having to then be driven back up. As the investigation into Andrea Piccolo rumbled on, the Italian dyed his hair blonde and started an OnlyFans account. Kaden Groves refused to smile during his Vuelta green jersey podium appearance, having taken the lead in that classification from the fallen Wout van Aert [September 6th].
Tadej Pogačar tried to go to Disneyland Paris during his layover en route to the Canadian WorldTour one-dayers while his customs paperwork was sorted, but his handler, UAE press relations head Luke Maguire, talked him off the ledge. Primož Roglič won his fourth Vuelta a España, tying him with Roberto Heras for most victories [September 13th]. Visma-Lease a Bike quickly deleted an auction on their website selling off Wout van Aert’s torn jersey from his Vuelta a España crash [September 16th].
Continuing their quest for revenue maximisation, Visma advertised Grand Tour hospitality packages including access to the team hotel the morning before the stage, a seat in a team car and the opportunity to help hand out bottles. Adrie van der Poel revealed he’s only hugged his son Mathieu once in his life, which he regrets. Wout van Aert signed a contract extension with Visma, end date: “until eternity” [September 20th].
Remco Evenepoel won the TT event at the World Championships despite not having power numbers and dropping his chain in the seconds before rolling out of the start hut. French revelation Paul Seixas gave a sweary interview after winning the Junior Men’s World Time Trial title [September 23rd]. Evenepoel announced he would be staying at Soudal-Quick Step, which makes news despite him having a valid contract with the team until the end of 2026. Lachlan Morton took time out of setting a new Ride Around Australia record to rescue an injured bird from the side of the road [September 27th].
Lotte Kopecky survived having her jersey cut off her with a boxcutter by a mechanic hanging out of a moving team car to defend her rainbow jersey, before then being dropped on the podium after her teammates tried and failed to hoist her up. Tadej Pogačar won the men’s Worlds race, with Eddy Merckx answering L’Équipe‘s phone call by saying Pogačar is obviously better than him now, which maybe was just a ploy to try and get people to leave him alone now. Mike Woods confused everyone after a TV moto showed him shovelling what looked like cereal and milk into his gob mid-Worlds road race, but it just turned out to be bicarb. Not quite as delicious [September 30th].
October: Not so secret squirrel 🐿️
On behalf of the fourth-placed Toms Skujiņš, Latvia protested Mathieu van der Poel’s illegal footpath riding en route to the bronze medal at the Worlds road race. The retiring Simon Geschke was given a bicycle guard of honour at the Münsterland Giro. The UCI Gravel World Championships saw both Van der Poel and Formula 1’s Vallteri Bottas on the same course at the same time, if only in different race categories [October 4th].
Lifetime Ineos rider Luke Rowe announced he’ll join Decathlon-Ag2r La Mondiale as a sports director in 2025. Van der Poel won the UCI Gravel Worlds. Former Colombian pro Marlon Pérez (48) was killed during a violent robbery at his home near Medellín. Lidl-Trek’s Mattias Skjelmose discovered he had a double hernia after feeling an intense pain in his back when sitting down for breakfast the day before Worlds. Tadej Pogačar held a massive mortadella on the podium after winning the Giro dell’Emilia [October 7th].
Visma-Lease a Bike’s Johannes Staune-Mittet uploaded a Strava ride with the caption “oh god, this is happening,” written in simplified Chinese and inferring his impending punishment departure to the Tour of Guangxi. Lael Wilcox set a new fastest women’s Around the World record of 108 days. A box of Soudal products got delivered to Visma HQ. Don’t worry, Remco wasn’t inside, they just had a leaky ceiling. Lanterne Rouge podcaster/Visma-Lease a Bike coach Patrick Broe revealed his plan to topple Pogačar in 2025 was that he’s been going to church a lot more [October 11th].
Tom Pidcock was “deselected” from Ineos Grenadiers’ Il Lombardia line-up 48 hours before the start, using his dogs’ Instagram account to voice his dismay. Pogačar won the Monument by three minutes so maybe Ineos were saving him the effort. Eli Iserbyt got disqualified from the first round of Exact Cross for stamping on Ryan Kamp’s bike. Tim Declercq won a race against a horse [October 14th].
Christopher Juul-Jensen helped out his friend’s restaurant by delivering pizzas by bike in full Jayco-AlUla get-up. Thibaut Pinot posted photos of himself hiking in Nepal. Tadej Pogačar signed a new contract until 2030 with a reported salary of €8 million a year. Intermarché-Wanty did some sponsor activation by hitting each other with pillows. TotalEnergies’ Emilien Jeannière got handed a really big fish on the podium for winning the Japanese Tour de Kyushu [October 25th].
The Tour du Faso in Burkina Faso was stripped of its UCI status due to a Russian team ‘CSKA Moscow’ participating in the event. Wout van Aert dressed up as a superhero squirrel and belted out Blur’s Song 2 for the Belgian version of the Masked Singer. Nacer Bouhanni ran the Frankfurt marathon in 2 hours 34 minutes. Mathieu van der Poel raced against rally cars at a criterium event in Spain [October 28th].
November: Yacht snuggles ⛵
While out running on holiday in Greece Demi Vollering saved a goat stuck in a big hole. Dave Brailsford took selfies outside Old Trafford having just paid £15 million to sack a Manchester United manager he re-signed a few months ago. Primož Roglič went all Bruce Lee on Mark Cavendish at the Saitama Criterium. The Tours de France revealed its routes, the Giro d’Italia pushed back its own course unveiling due to rumoured issues with the Albanian Grande Partenza [November 1st].
A fan threw beer at Eli Iserbyt at the Koppenbergcross [November 4th], 10,000 cyclists gathered in Medellín for the Giro del Rigo to celebrate the end of Urán’s 19-year career. Steve Cummings finally announced his departure from Ineos Grenadiers via a LinkedIn post. Laurens ten Dam chose the only job that’s more of a pain in the arse than one involving getting chucked in jail for changing in the car park of a Mexican restaurant in Oklahoma when he was just trying to do a spot of gravel racing: manager of the Dutch women’s national team. Jonas Vingegaard got photographed in a garden centre wearing a very long coat [November 8th].
Mark Cavendish ‘won’ the Singapore Criterium, his self-professed “last-ever professional race.” The organisers of the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana lost 95 per cent of their materials after their warehouse was caught up in the region’s floods [November 11th].
Philippe Gilbert got big pissed off when the Belgian federation chose Serge Pauwels over him for the vacant national men’s coach role. Tom Pidcock chose violence when given an easy lay-up on stage at Rouleur Live, saying that things are not sorted between him and the Ineos Grenadiers. 48-year-old Oscar Sevilla won the opening stage of the 2.2 Vuelta a Ecuador. Fun fact: when he turned professional with Kelme in 1998, Tadej Pogačar wasn’t even born yet [November 15th].
Chris Froome and Mark Cavendish snuggled up on a yacht in Miami, Trinity Racing and Saint Piran shut down, leaving the UK without a men’s UCI Continental team. Eli Iserbyt was brought down by a photographer at the Flandriencross [November 18th].
Jonas Vingegaard went for a spin around the Visma offices in Copenhagen, creditors’ claims against Bradley Wiggins doubled from £1 million to £2 million after a revision of figures, and Tadej Pogačar quickly deleted a photo of him given the middle finger to the camera from his Instagram account, but not before we got a screenshot [November 22nd].
Pogačar won the Padel tournament hosted by his agency [November 25th], while David Lappartient forgot/didn’t bother to renew the URL for his old UCI Presidency bid website and so it now directs you to a website with information about Singaporean poker. Alberto Contador beat Chris Froome in a BKOOL virtual race. Someone uploaded Marco Pantani’s fastest climbs to Strava to usurp WorldTour hopeful Jack Burke, who’s been going around taking the KOMs of various mythical European climbs [November 29th].
December: Big Dairy 🥛
Wout van Aert picked up the mic for another rendition of Song 2 at Visma-Lease a Bike’s Christmas party, Steve Cummings was announced as a Jayco-AlUla DS for 2025 [December 2nd]. Remco Evenepoel got doored by a postal van, sending the company’s stock through the roof, while DSM-Firmenich (the company) was forced to issue a statement decrying the “mistruths and misinformation” after British conspiracy theorists start pouring milk down their sinks and toilets in protest of a new cow feed additive that reduces methane emissions in dairy cows. The Brits claimed it’s all part of a depopulation plot involving Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates. Tom Pidcock’s departure from Ineos Grenadiers was finally confirmed and he transferred to Doug Ryder’s Q36.5 ProTeam squad. Chris Froome continued his off-season bromance tour with Mark Cavendish, winning the Gran Fondo Sun Moon Lake in Taiwan [December 6th].
EF sponsor Oatly was told by a British court that it can no longer market itself as milk, with Oatly decrying the decision as a win for “Big Dairy” [December 9th].
“The last dinosaur” was L’Équipe‘s headline as Patrick Lefevere stepped down as Soudal-Quick Step CEO. Ilnur Zakarin admitted to betting a grand on teammate Marcel Kittel to win a stage of the 2018 Tour de France because he saw the German sprinter eat three plates of pasta at dinner and proclaim he was feeling good and felt like he would win the next day. He did not win the next day. Retiring Swiss road and track cyclist Claudio Imhof announced he was planning on becoming a train driver. Eddy Merckx required a total hip replacement after falling off his bike, pledging to never ride alone again. ASO signed up for 25 more years of the Deutschland Tour [December 13th].
Groupama-FDJ created a version of the Guess Who? board game featuring their own staff and riders, Mark Cavendish was handed the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Lifetime Achievement award but says he’d preferred to have been nominated for the regular award instead [December 16th].
Jayco-AlUla teamed up with MAAP to create a stonking new jersey that made us forget about All The Bad Stuff for a second, Tom Pidcock uploaded a video telling his dog a bedtime story [December 20th].
Enough Corrections Corners for a Corrections Cul-de-Sac 🏠🏠🏠
That’s right! We were just using our human fallibility to get ourselves on the corrections property ladder, like the weirdest version of Monopoly you hope never to play.
But seriously, we continue to hope and pray that our knowledge blind spots and occasional inaccuracies as we race to get you the news fresh off the press twice weekly is still viewed as a part of this bumbling newsletter operation’s charm. We hope you get your kicks out of getting to comment “well, actually” on a fairly regular basis. It definitely keeps us honest when we spend a lot of time poking and prodding at the oddities and excesses of the cycling world.
What was your favourite glaring error? When we incorrectly called that Annemiek van Vleuten had finished 17th in the Dutch national cyclocross championships a week before they actually took place? When we attributed Trent Reznor’s ‘Hurt’ to Johnny Cash? What about when we said there was a Giro d’Italia stage when actually it was a Monday rest day? Which we then did again with the Tour de France two months later.
Or maybe it was when we said Jonas Vingegaard had a temporary tattoo of Paw Patrol’s Marshall on his hand, when it was in fact Zuma (okay, this one is on Caley Fretz, father of two, my household is blessedly copaganda-free apart from Mondays at 8pm when we watch Police Interceptors).
Nope, our favourite was lambasting Mikel Landa for not recognising the Golden Gate Bridge, when in fact the bridge in question was the 25 de Abril Bridge in Lisbon. That one really shook us to our core. Closely followed by our insistence that Disneyland Paris was closer to Lille than Paris, which also posed some difficult questions for my parents as I enquired whether we’d ever actually visited Disneyland Paris at all on that holiday or just been taken to the local park with my dad dressed up as Mickey…
There were also Labour Day and Roman/medieval-related mishaps, but honestly this article has gone on long enough. Forgive and forget I say! Things might get better next year!
And finally … a very big THANK YOU 🙏
Yep, that’s the last thing to say. A massive THANKS. For reading, for commenting, for coming up with jokes better than mine and posting them in the comments. This weird component of the wider Escape Collective universe is still going strong 20 months in because you lot talk back to me via this newsletter twice a week.
It’s still an absolute delight getting up every Monday and Friday morning and pushing this out into the universe, so yeah, I really appreciate it. It’s still the most fun I’ve ever had at ‘work’ and long may that continue. Merry Christmas.
🧺 Send us yer laundry pics
“Greetings from Honesdale, Pennsylvania in the Pocono Mountains (where “Winter Wonderland” was first penned; how seasonally appropriate) where I stumbled across the laundromat EC recently opened,” writes Nathaniel Heller, attaching today’s non-Escape Collective affiliated laundromat. “Cheers to such innovative revenue diversification!”
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: jonny.long@escapecollective.com
Until next time …
That’s all folks! Thanks to Nathaniel Heller 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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