RadioCycling

Tour de France preview: featuring Jonathan Vaughters, Marcel Kittel, Fred Wright, Tadej Pogačar’s coach, and Ineos’s transfer riddle

RadioCycling will be offering three episodes a week during the Tour de France and Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift. Our first Tour-themed show, backed by our new sponsor Saddle Skedaddle, offers a blitz of the latest news going into the world's greatest race.We start with the latest on transfer dealings at Ineos Grenadiers, where there's a lot of outward traffic but very little movement in the other direction. With Tao Geoghegan-Hart, Ben Tulett, Pavel Sivakov, Carlos Rodríguez and now Dani Martínez all heavily linked with moves away from the British super squad, we examine the Ineos transfer strategy. Is there a big signing in the offing?EF Education-EasyPost have named what's arguably their strongest ever line-up for the Tour. Team boss Jonathan Vaughters tells us about their strategy going into the race, why he's expecting team leader Richard Carapaz to come good over the next three weeks, and also offers some suggestions on how to improve rider safety in the wake of Gino Mäder's tragic death at the Tour of Switzerland.Fears that Tadej Pogačar might be forced to sit out the Tour after breaking a wrist in April have been allayed and the two-time champion is fit and raring to go. UAE Team Emirates head coach Iñigo San Millán has played a vital role in Pogačar's return to peak fitness and tells us about Pogačar's training regime during this period and also the UAE leader's love of a chocolate mousse.Most of the pre-Tour talk has, inevitably, been about the GC battle, but what's in store for the clash of the sprinting titans?  We turned to Marcel Kittel for an expert's analysis of this contest. Winner of 14 Tour stages, Kittel also reveals why Mark Cavendish was always his biggest rival and who he expects to emerge as this year's Tourminator of the bunch sprints.Last weekend fan favourite Fred Wright took a highly emotional first professional win in the British road championship. The Londoner lifts the lid on what he expects to be an action-packed race for his Bahrain Victorious team, which will be aiming to contend on all fronts.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ineos unleash the British Ganna; the very latest on Jumbo and their rumoured Saudi sponsor; Giro Donne saved at the last; what next for Froome?

While Ineos teenager Josh Tarling was expected to be among the medallists in the British TT championship, his victory by more than a minute over his rivals did cause a stir. We speak to his former coach Stuart Blunt about the 19-year-old Welshman, who Blunt describes as a "British Filippo Ganna".We've got a Jumbo-Visma double, starting with the latest from team manager Richard Plugge on the Dutch team's search for a new lead sponsor. Plugge refuses to confirm press rumours of discussions with Saudi enterprise Neom City, but says there's been global interest in backing the team that features Jonas Vingegaard, Wout van Aert and Primož Roglič and that he's confident a deal will soon be concluded.Underlining their long-term commitment to the sport, Jumbo-Visma have also been busy in the transfer market. We reveal the latest on their rumoured deal with Ineos GC prospect Ben Tulett, and we speak to their head of development Robert de Groot about their newly announced signing of three British 17 year olds to their development team, as squad that's designed to keep them competitive but at relatively low cost. The Giro Donne is on! After months of uncertainty and discord between the race's owner and its organiser, a compromise has been reached over the running of the second women's Grand Tour of the season. We examine the reasons for the dispute that left the Italian race looking into the abyss. Every year there's a major Tour non-selection story and this year's has featured four-time champion Chris Froome, who has been passed over by his Israel-PremierTech team. We look at what was behind that decision and at what's next for Froome, whose immediate racing future is decidedly uncertain.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tour de France culture special: A look at the good and bad of Netflix’s Unchained, plus the cycling films you definitely should see and the books you ...

From Orson Welles to Ernest Hemingway, Ben Stiller to Paul Smith, Dustin Hoffman to Samuel Beckett, the Tour de France has long had many famous fans in the world of culture and the arts. Now the race has had the Netflix treatment with Unchained, their much-heralded series about the 2022 Tour. Enjoyable as it was, the series only showed a glimpse inside the madness, excitement and intrigue of the world's biggest bike race.  So what about the other great cinematic and literary gems, classics and faux pas of the world's greatest bike race? This episode is a high-speed tribute to the best books and most revealing films that have been made on the culture of the Tour. We're not saying it's definitive, just that these are our personal favourites...Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ukraine special: 16 months after the Russian invasion, RadioCycling investigates the impact of the war on Ukrainian cycling and its riders

Soon after Ukraine was invaded by Russia in February 2022, RadioCycling's Chris Marshall-Bell began investigating the impact of the war that has ensued has had on Ukrainian cycling and its cycling community.16 months on, RadioCycling presents this special episode on Ukraine. It focuses on one of the country's leading coaches, Oleksandr Kulyk, who was killed six days into the conflict, and his son, Andriy, his country's national road race champion in 2019.Andriy Kulyk's moving account of his father's life as a coach to Olympic champions and his death under a Russian artillery barrage encapsulates the fate of Ukraine's cyclists. It's a tale of devastation wrought, but of hope maintained, and also of a desire for the rest of the world to maintain its focus on Ukraine and its people...Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tour selection storm at Groupama; team radios opened up to Tour fans; Steve Cummings on Ineos’s Tour selection dilemmas; transfer rumour mill ramps up

Tour de France selection is always a tricky business, team managers giving good news to some riders and dismaying others. This is typified by the hullabaloo at Groupama-FDJ, where team boss Marc Madiot has delighted Thibaut Pinot fans by selecting the mercurial climber for a final lap of France before his retirement, but made way for him by discarding sprinter Arnaud Démare, who's had the Tour on his programme all year. We delve into the news that created beaucoup de brouhaha in France.Staying with Tour selection, we examine the riders pushing their case at the Tour of Switzerland and speak to Ineos directeur sportif Steve Cummings, who reveals that the British team's line-up is still very much under discussion after a Critérium du Dauphiné showing that left them with more questions than answers.Cycling has followed F1 in its Netflix treatment of the sport, and now it's set to follow suit in another intriguing way with team radio transmissions being opened to fans during the Tour de France. The move is designed to offer more clarity on team tactics, but, as Jayco-Alula directeur sportif Matt White tells us, the teams aren't completely sold on the idea of letting their rivals know what they're up to when the race is on.The Tour de France is just around the corner and, as is the case every season, that has been the trigger for the transfer rumour mill to pick up speed. We look at who's going where, who's staying put and which teams are looking to move up the hierarchy and challenge the big four squads at the top.   Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dauphiné debrief: Vingegaard marches on; chaos at Tour des Pyrénées; LeMond’s battle with leukaemia; big plans for Vuelta Femenina;

If the Critérium du Dauphiné's ability to highlight the Tour de France favourites once again proves reliable, Jonas Vingegaard is going to be hard to stop as he aims to defend his title in July. We examine the Dane's dismantling of his rivals in the French Alps, look at which of them have emerged from  the Dauphiné with reason for optimism and, on the flip side, those who have left with their reputations tarnished.Liker the  Dauphiné, the Tour International Féminin des Pyrénées was scheduled to have a Sunday afternoon finish, but instead the three-day stage event ended in chaos and acrimony on the final morning with riders and teams refusing to race due to safety fears after repeated incursions by cars on the route. We hear from the CPA riders' union president Adam Hansen, who negotiated on the racers' behalf, about what went wrong and how it can be put right. Were the riders really "spoilt children" as the race director asserted?Our colleague Shane Stokes caught up with three-time Tour de France champion Greg LeMond earlier this week. In extracts from their conversation, we hear about the  former world champion's battle with leukaemia and how it's finally going his way after his initial fears that it might beat him, and  about his plans for carbon fibre innovation in the bike industry and a relaunch for his bike brand.  We close with another exclusive that came out of Chris Marshall-Bell's interview with Vuelta a España director Javier Guillén, who reveals that the Spanish Grand Tour is actively looking for more starts. He also lifts the lid on big plans for the Vuelta Femenina, launched with huge success as a seven-day race last month. Guillén admits that he wants the race to be longer, perhaps more than twice as long in the medium team...Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vuelta boss Guillén dismisses date change; Bossuyt: I’m the victim in doping affair; Gee can target Classics and GTs says Israel DS; Bora set focus on...

Our latest episode kicks off with an exclusive interview with Vuelta a España director Javier Guillén, who tells us that there's absolutely no prospect of the Vuelta swapping dates with the Giro d'Italia, a move that many were pushing for as a possible solution to the bad weather that perennially affects Italy's Grand Tour. "No, no and no!" declares Guillén. Looking ahead to this year's Vuelta, now just 10 weeks away, Guillén says all the big names will be welcome and discussions are under way to tempt the likes of defending champion Remco Evenepoel and three-time winner Primož Roglič back to Spain in late AugustAfter being made "provisionally non-active" by her Canyon//SRAM team following a positive test for the banned product Letrozole, Belgian world track champion Shari Bossuyt has given her side of the story in a press conference. In it, Bossuyt said her situation was like being put "in prison for murder when you didn't commit murder." Everyone's gone Derek Gee-crazy following his stand-out performance at the Giro d'Italia, and that includes his Israel-Premier Tech team, who've signed him to a contract that runs to the end of 2028. Team director Steve Bauer tells us about the qualities that make Gee so special and why the Canadian sensation could become a power in the Classics as well as the Grand Tours.Bora-Hansgrohe director Rolf Aldag tells why and how the German WorldTour team are set to change tack for the Grand Tours and challenge the big-hitting teams that tend to dominate the GC battle in these marquee races. As part of that strategy, he reveals that the upcoming Tour de France will probably be the last that they'll go into with a sprinter as well as a GC leader.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Pogačar fresh but short of racing for the Tour; Canyon hit by doping affair; UCI tighten block on Russians; Uzbek motorbike mayhem

Tadej Pogačar discloses that there positive and negative sides to his racing layoff after he broke his wrist at Liège-Bastogne-Liège in April. On the up side, he'll be fresh going into the Tour de France, but he acknowledges he'll be short of racing and that his wrist may still be hampering his punchy style. We hear what the two-time Tour champ has to say.Canyon//SRAM are in the midst of a doping after their Belgian sprinter and world track champion Shari Bossuyt tested positive at the Tour of Normandy in March. We look at why Bossuyt's case has already taken a bizarre twist, evoking comparisons with cyclo-cross star Toon Aerts' positive test from 2022.   RadioCycling's first episode featured the story of the Russian Olympic track medallist and leading women's racer with close links to the Russian army. Four weeks on, the UCI has cracked down on such riders by tightening its rules on access to its racers.Something fishy in Uzbekistan? After Uzbek riders were accused of getting assistance from motorbikes at a race in their homeland, we speak to a highly experienced former WorldTour rider who was also at the event to get his take.   Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jonas Vingegaard in his best shape ever, says Jumbo coach; the Tour sets its sights on Brittany and Britain - in 2024 and 2026; will Man Utd takeover ...

Jonas Vingegaard is stronger and more confident than ever, that's according to  Mathieu Heijboer. Jumbo-Visma's head of performance tells that us that, while the Dane is still shy and retiring off the bike,  Vingegaard has moved on another level when he's racing and is full of confidence as he prepares to defend the Tour de France title.Scotland, England, Wales: This seems increasingly likely to be the order for the three stages that will form the Grand Départ of the 2026 Tour de France. We lift the lid on the latest details, including the possibility of an epic third stage across Wales from north to south.  While Sir Jim Ratcliffe and Ineos close on a deal to buy Manchester United, we look at where these negotiations leave the Ineos Grenadiers. Will the sports-mad billionaire continue with his commitment to bike racing?Brittany is being lined up to host the start of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes.  We examine how this could effect the race route and also at the race's change to mid-August  dates in order to avoid a clash with the Paris Olympics. Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Giro wrap: redemption for Roglič; what next for Ineos?; Lefevere says ”hands off Remco”; Britain’s young talent face funding crisis

Roglič redemption: Thomas the fall guy as Primož slays his demons. We hear from Jumbo-Visma's Grand Tour debutant and reluctant oboeist Thomas Gloag about his Giro and riding for the race's newly-crowned champion.Plus, Olympic champion Ed Clancy, a close friend of Mark Cavendish's since they were kids, reflects on the Briton's stunning final stage victory in Rome.Ineos left shattered as Jumbo numbers tell in the end. Sports director Oli Cookson gives the British team's perspective on the second Giro in succession where victory has been snatched from them on the final mountain stage.Tug of love: Patrick Lefevere tells Ineos "hands off Remco!" How will the behind-the-scenes battle for the prodigiously talented world champion play out? News exclusive: We reveal that the conveyor belt of young road racing talent that's been produced over the last two decades by British Cycling under-23 racing programmes could end as funding looks set to be cut completely – unless the federation's members take a stand. Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices