Welcome And Stage 15 Setup

SPEAKER_00 1:27

All right. Welcome back to the Cycling Men of Leisure's leisure breakaway. Our look at the day's Tour de France stage. Well, let me tell you, unforgettable mountains today. A major upset in the overall standings and one heartbreaking crash that changed this entire race. Let's break down the drama from stage 15. I'm Michael, and with me as always is my good friend Adam. Good evening. I have a lot to add tonight, buddy. That's awesome. I look forward to it. You've been adding some very interesting uh conversation to this, so I'm very, very happy because I got to admit I was a little concerned at the beginning because I know you really didn't pay attention to any of this, and then it was like you weren't going to get into it, but man, you have jumped in with both feet, I've got to say.

SPEAKER_04 2:26

I watched a very cool, uh, I'm gonna say like 26-minute extended version. Uh, had plans with the family today, went to see the Odyssey. By the way, I normally don't give movie recommendations, but I must say the new Odyssey, Christopher Nolan, uh Matt Damon, Ann Hathaway, uh Charlie Saron. I mean, oh my gosh. I mean, it just goes on and on and on. Great, great movie. But but when I came back, I watched um I watched a few of the highlight reels. Um, and I'm not gonna steal your thunder because I know this is uh you got all kinds of stuff for us, but wow, a lot of stuff happened today.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

A lot of things happened today. Today, total distance, 183.9 kilometers. For us Americans, that's 114.3 miles. Average temperature. It was a beautiful day temperature-wise, 24 degrees Celsius. That is 75 degrees Fahrenheit, so way cooler than what they had been uh riding in and experiencing before. Total climb, approximately 3,950 meters, which is 12,960 feet of elevation. And let me tell you, stage winner today, I was a little worried it was gonna

Stage Stats And Breakaway Chaos

SPEAKER_00 3:46

be the usual, it was gonna be another toddy win, but Rimco Everpool, Belgium cyclist, won the stage today. Um his average speed, and we were in mountains, 22.1 miles per hour. That's 35.5 kilometers an hour. Uh incredible. What's that?

SPEAKER_04 4:10

I was gonna say, did you see when they showed the time? Just the the the speed of the overall ride race. I guess I guess I should have been more clear. Like Evan Pool's time, Pagatha's time, and Del Toro's time, how long it took them?

SPEAKER_00 4:26

I know, but I know it was fast.

SPEAKER_04 4:29

What I thought was interesting is Evanpool and Pagatha had the same exact time. I'm like, well, how could he be second then if he has the same time?

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Uh just a split second. Uh yeah. It was cool. No, but it was a fast ride ride. I mean, uh the announcers were all going, man, we cannot believe how fast, being mountains that this is, how fast the overall Peloton was was speeding through. Had several, had a breakaway early on, it got pulled back, and oh my gosh. Then they had this huge breakaway of like 20, 20 riders, and that eventually broke up. And man, I was thinking today was gonna be the day that an American won the stage. Didn't pull that off, but uh it it kept it exciting. I'll t I'll talk about the team dynamics here in a minute, but uh Rimco Evanpool earned one of his biggest victories of his career. He outsprinted Toddy on a you know brutal summit finish. The defining moment, though, has to be uh uh Jonas Vindigo. He crashed about 20 kilometers out and unfortunately, I feel his pain, fractured his clavicle and had to abandon the race. He was the number two guy, only about four minutes behind uh Toddy. So that kind of shook it up. So now second and third place are up for grabs. So that was was sad there, um, but it really fired, I think fired a lot of a lot

Vingegaard Crash Changes The Tour

SPEAKER_00 6:11

of writers up, thinking, okay, this changes up things quite a bit. Toddy still controls uh the yellow jersey. Uh Del Toro, right there at the finish line. I mean, he is just you know blowing it out as far as the new writers go. And I think the biggest mystery of the day, and I'm not gonna talk about another subject because I know you're gonna bring that up, but one of the biggest mysteries of the day is kind of what were some of the teams thinking. Vindigo's team, I mean, was out there just driving and driving, and everybody kept saying, uh, Vindigo's gonna, you know, he's gonna go, he's gonna attack on the hills, he's gonna do something great. And I I would like to know what that the plan was because it didn't happen. Um, there was a big debate, yeah, he's gonna attack on like the first mountains. And Vindigo's not the type of guy that does a lot of attacking on the mountains, but his team was up front just driving the Peloton for kilometers. And unfortunately, Vindigo goes down. Uh, you know, it's kind of over. So we never got to see what his team, what their plan was. And I uh that really bothers me. I'd like to have seen why they were pushing so hard because the way they were pushing, if there was no big attack planned or something of that nature, they were basically setting it up for Tate to to win again if there was no big plan for a major attack or something. So uh it perplexed me, it perplexed the commentators. So we probably never know. Just one of those interesting mysteries. But um incredible day. Uh, you know, you hate to see somebody go out, and certainly somebody who's setting in you know the second place position, but that is cycling.

SPEAKER_04 8:16

I was enjoying Quinn Simmons. I I uh I was watching, and and he was just attacking, attacking, and leading and leading and leading. I'm like, come on, baby, come on, come on.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

But I thought, yes, America's gonna do something. No. Did you you probably didn't see this? There was a guy on the one of the spectators who had like the mullet long hair and was dressed just like him.

SPEAKER_04 8:42

Outran him, outran him up the hill.

SPEAKER_00 8:45

Yeah, and reached out and and Quinn gave him the you know the high five, and then he takes off running

Quinn Simmons Sparks American Hope

SPEAKER_00 8:51

and catches up to him and says something to him. It was just kind of a cool moment that he acknowledged, you know, the this fan.

SPEAKER_04 8:58

So I I you know, as an American, you know, we we have these um policies and procedures for the American flag. I think that goes out the window of the Tour de France because when that guy with the mullet was running with the flag, I'm like, oh bro, you're not supposed to be doing that with a flag.

SPEAKER_00 9:15

So yeah, they're wearing it as clothes, they're dropping it on the ground. It's like, uh, and you know, you and I, we the we understand there are rules for the United States flag. There's certain things you do and don't do, and uh yeah. Tour de France, yeah, you're in France, I guess, so I guess the rules change, or you don't have to honor them.

SPEAKER_04 9:40

One of the coolest, um I mean like like like cool as in wow, that's really cool, is watching Quinn Simmons, and he's climbing this hill that I would be holding on for dear life in the biggest gear possible, barely snail crawling up the hill. Nope, he's full speed, takes both hands off of the off the wheel, off the off the handlebar, goes in the back of his jersey, puts on his glasses like Mr. Cool, gets a gets like an energy gel block or whatever. The whole time he keeps looking back while while not having any hands on the handlebar. And I was just like, yeah, uh, he's just another league. There's no way I could do that.

SPEAKER_00 10:24

So remember, this man is a paid, trained professional, so there's a difference.

SPEAKER_04 10:31

He's 26 years old from Los Angeles.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Uh nevertheless, he's out there doing it. And he had a strong day. I he did get the the most uh aggressive uh writer. So I mean, which he deserved it. I mean, he was just crushing it. So what do you got for us?

SPEAKER_04 10:54

Well, we had a little bit of overnight controversy, and yes, we did. And I thought it could could could lead in because it's a podcast and people are hopefully listening. You can watch me too and watch you as well. Uh, but I thought it could give us something to talk about. So we had an overnight controversy at two o'clock in the morning. The gentleman that you mentioned, who is unfortunately is uh removed from the Tour de France um was Jonas Vindegaard. He was awoken at 2 a.m. for an anti-doping test, and then Pagaccha was awoken at 5 a.m. Um, and before I go yammering on with some facts, it says the current anti-doping rules

The 2 A.M. Anti-Doping Controversy

SPEAKER_04 11:36

permit testing between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. And these surprise controls are intended to detect substances that may only remain uh uh detectable for a short period of time. And what were the writers' reactions? Neither writer criticized the anti-doping itself, although both questioned whether middle of the night testing is appropriate before one of the cycling hardest cyclists hardest races. Uh Vindegaard said it took him about 40 minutes to get back to sleep, and Pagaccha said he about only got four hours of sleep before the race. So uh before I go on, um I don't know. It seems kind of controversial. I understand they're trying to make it clean and concise based upon your favorite gentleman, Mr. Armstrong. Um, but man, two o'clock in the morning waking up, I mean, that's then did that have anything to do with the crash?

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Or well, what I would really like to know first off is how many of the other riders had those tests? Gotcha. Was it just these two riders had those tests in the middle of the night, or did they do a whole slate of riders, you know, throughout the night? The other thing, okay, I get it. I'm all for anti-doping. You know me, I'm not a big fan of certain cyclists who have been caught doping, and I think it's wrong, and then there's no place for it. Um, but I think it could be done better from my point of view. You can do it from 11 to 6 in the morning. Well, okay, that's fine. Then why don't you do it at, you know, five in the morning, five thirty in the morning, uh, you know, five forty-five. I mean, these these guys are getting up early anyway. So why don't you do it like right before uh, you know, so it's not like two o'clock in the morning. I mean, that's the middle of the night, literally. That makes it really, really rough and really difficult. I think you could do it either earlier in the evening or later in the evening. Or later in the morning, later in the evening, earlier in the morning, that kind of thing. So it's closer to when they might be going to sleep and when they might be getting up instead of like right in the middle of the night. Um I don't know. I I just I think it's I understand you gotta do it. Uh I don't think two o'clock in the morning is an appropriate time. And everybody seemed to be focused, all the commentators seem to be focused on the five o'clock uh with Tate. You know, it's like, well, they mentioned the two o'clock one, but I'd be like, well, two o'clock? By five, I mean you're like thinking about getting out of bed or getting, you know, it's getting close to the alarm, but I would think. Two, you know, you're not getting up to start your day at you know, 3 30 in the morning or something. So just my thought.

SPEAKER_04 14:30

No, definitely, definitely thought it would be a good uh talking point. Um so yeah, we got the uh um sorry about that. Um very interesting to listen to the commentators myself is because they were torn. A part of them were were, you know, the the institution of the race that should be honored with clean racing, but at the same time just kind of put a bad taste in everyone's mouth. But um what what uh what I noticed uh now this this first bit of homework that I did as well was before I left to go on with my family, but at the time it said that uh Pagaccha merging with an even stronger grip on the yellow jersey heading into the final week. What I noticed was definitely the tone of some of the announcers um and some of the commentators I was listening to on YouTube were definitely like it's almost impossible, short of him having um an accident or something, that there was not not a way to catch him. But the wording I'd like to also ask you about is is of course Vandegaard. Everywhere kept saying he abandoned the race. And I guess for me, what was difficult is if I abandoned Ragbri or I or I I abandoned Bragg, it's like I'm self-pulling myself out. Um I mean, did he pull himself out because he got injured, or does the team pull him out because he got injured? Because or or is it just just the terminology of the language barrier?

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Basically, you leave the race one of two ways. Well, you either finish the race, or if you leave the race in the middle, you either finish it by being disqualified or you abandon the race. Okay. Um disqualified, obviously, time or some kind of huge crazy sanction. Um, but anything else, it's abandoned. I mean, if it's you get an illness, you're abandoned. If you have a crash and can't continue, just the terminology they use. I mean, he he clearly I knew right off that he had pretty much, and anybody really paying attention would have known right off that he had done something to his collarbone because I mean it was just a mere probably 45 seconds, and the doctor was already getting, you know, the arm sling and that kind of stuff, so you kind of knew he wasn't coming back. But no, uh, it he left the race. Uh just the term they use, abandon.

SPEAKER_04 17:00

What about uh was there you think think there was a garden hose there?

SPEAKER_00 17:04

Or uh I I was checking the ground very uh very closely uh because I was having flashbacks and PTSD and all that kind of thing. But um, no, there was no garden hose. There was a uh it looks like um, you know, there was obviously a curb there, and it really looks like that uh bandigo did it, did it himself, came out a little wide around the corner, um, you know, tried to like readjust his line and you know, clip the clip the curb and went down. And he, you know, uh Del Toro went down too. Del Toro was a little, you know, a few steps behind him. Uh he went down, but it looked like more like he saw it come and slammed on his brakes and just kind of you know set down on the side of the road and then was able to get back up and start riding. So fortunately, no one else was injured. You know, it's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_04 18:08

It's a nature of the beast. I saw the angle that I was watching was kind of like through some trees. It must have been a drone or a helicopter, and um and you you could see the whole crash, but it was through the branches. But there was spectators right there as well. So, I mean, spectators almost uh definitely almost got hit as well.

SPEAKER_00 18:31

So spectators have to be paying attention. Oh, there were several spectators there, they all got out of the way. One lady did get knocked down. Um, she seemed to be okay from the view that I saw. She got right back up and everything. But yeah, I mean, when you put yourself right there that close to the race, you gotta you gotta be paying attention because you know, a bicycle might come in your direction. And it's it's happened before where spectators have been hit, knocked down, had to be, you know, taken out because uh, you know, they got injured as well.

SPEAKER_04 19:05

So I had mentioned that the research that I that I did was before I went with my family, and then I got back and I wanted to make sure that I was thorough and concise, and I saw a new news story, and I'd like to mention this now. So when I got back, I said any changes on the previous history that I looked at, and it came back and said, Did you have the Tom Pitcock story? And I was like, No, I don't have that, I need that. What is that? And um, so we have a penalty. Uh, we talked about it earlier uh in this mini-series about how you know you you called it a um sticky bottle, or you call, you know, uh different different terminology. Uh, but here's what happened. So Tom Pitcock was penalized uh during stage 15 after the race officials determined that he received illegal assistance by pushing off his team car while accelerating back up to speed. And here's the penalties. He got a 20 seconds added to the overall Tour de

Pidcock Penalty And UCI Rules

SPEAKER_04 20:07

France time, he got a fine of, as you've mentioned before, Swiss francs, 400 Swiss francs, approximately 500 bucks American. He also got a deduction of 30 UCI World Ranking Points. So let's have a classification what that means. The 30-point deduction was from the UCI uh World Ranking System. These are not Tour de France, Green Jersey, or King of the Mountain points. But what is the impact? The 20 second time penalty affects his general classification standings by increasing the cumulative race time. The fine is a discipline penalty and separate from any any stage or prize money. And why was he penalized? Under the UCI rules, riders may receive mechanical assistance from the teen car, but they may not use the vehicle to gain an unfair accelerations. Officials ruled that Pitcock received an illegal push-off, resulting in the sanctions above. So that was uh in the news as I came back. So I'm not saying that it wasn't there earlier, it just took me six hours to get it.

SPEAKER_00 21:11

So what you're saying is you got a flag.

SPEAKER_04 21:15

Yeah, I'm throwing the flag.

SPEAKER_00 21:17

Oh, I got to use the yellow flag.

SPEAKER_04 21:18

Woo! That's right. But uh, but that's I mean, uh I didn't want to steal your thunder. I mean, we definitely have tomorrow is a rest day. I'll let you talk about that. And then uh then I have a couple of ragbri pieces, and then uh I'll give everyone their favorite song I know they've been holding out for.

SPEAKER_00 21:43

Okay, a couple things. Uh jerseys really didn't change. Uh the I well, the only jersey that really did change, I should say, is the white jersey. Del Toro uh is back in that, and then like I said, Quinn Simmons got uh most aggressive uh writers, so none of that uh really changed up anything. Uh tomorrow is the second and final rest day. So there is no racing tomorrow. Um racing will resume on Tuesday for stage 16. Uh and that, a little bit different. That's gonna be individual time trials. If you remember two weeks ago when we started this adventure, they did uh team time trials. Um Tuesday, they will be doing individual time trials.

Rest Day And Time Trial Preview

SPEAKER_00 22:32

And there are some potentials there to create some uh meaningful gaps among the general classification uh contenders before they hit head back into the Alps. And honestly, my personal opinion and I love the Alps are always the best and most. Exciting for me, so I'll be looking forward to that.

SPEAKER_04 22:54

That's great. I uh I'm um makes me happy to hear that. Um I'm gonna switch gears to Rag Bri 53. I look forward to meeting with you tomorrow for the rest day. We'll do a recap of where the where the tour is so far. If someone's joined our little mini-series late, we'll be able to give a synopsis of day one through through the second rest day, um, and uh give any highlights and bullet points and such. Uh, but let's talk about Ragbri 53. We got we got our friends out there, Keith and Melanie, but our also we have our friend Wade Paul. Uh, yesterday he wrote us and said, Hey, I'm out here at Ragbury. I missed the meetup because I rolled in around meetup time. Uh, but he can report that it's very hot. Uh, he said Casey's

RAGBRAI Heat And Road Etiquette

SPEAKER_04 23:47

report uh that they went for 24-hour operation for the event. The coffee is hot and the donuts are good. Franny's cafe has good pie and tenderloin. Central time is where it's at, he says. But today, he added hot off the press, right before we recorded. I'm at Ragbright, and there's something you need to mention on your show. Get over. Shout. He said, I've seen two people refuse to get out of the left hand lanes as emergency vehicles are not showing flashers and trying to go around. Um, one guy had to get honked at by the ambulance that had been following him for a quarter mile, and surprisingly, four people, including myself, yelled car back at him. Also had a friend who saw a terrible wreck as a guy didn't look to see if he could pass and got taken out by a guy who didn't yell on your left as he went zooming by. People need to be signaling their intentions with both words and arm motions. I'll die on that hill. Listen, buddy. Amen. I mean, you and I saw some of the craziest beep. Oh, wait, where it is here. Um when we were out there. I remember the one time that poor gentleman who uh got severely hurt on the center crack, maybe our second rag bride together. Ambulance was there. Now, here I'm gonna set the scene. You were there, but let me set the scene for anyone else listening. Ambulance goes by us, nobody stops the ambulance. Ambulance goes by, you know, wee woo, wee woo, wee woo goes up. Unfortunately, the gentleman needs a lot of France. Yeah, listen. Go ahead. It's late. But um, so ambulance stops. Poor gentleman is laying on the ground. They put him on the stretcher. Now, here I'm I'm gonna set the scene for you. In the left hand lane was a full-size ambulance rig. In the right side lane was the poor gentleman who went in the center crack, went down. And then you had thousands, if not thousands, hundreds, hundreds of cyclists are like, you can't stop me, copper. And they're trying to like, they're trying to ride, not like be respectful. And you and I were just so disgusted, I'll never forget. Um, you and I, and about 30 guys, uh, and ladies, by the way, we dismounted our bikes and we were trying to wave people over, and then we kind of made our own arrow, and so people then had to get off and walk around the ambulance. But and it was there for quite some time, and it was kind of a somber, quiet moment because after what we could only assume the gentleman was then loaded up into the ambulance, and then you and I had made it maybe half a mile, three, I don't know when I lie, but we had made it some way down the road, and full full code, full lights and sirens code, and everybody was just kind of like somber because they saw the guy lying there, and then uh I don't even know if I remember what happened to him. Did we ever find out?

SPEAKER_00 27:05

Or I if I remember right, I don't think he he made it. If that's the one I'm thinking about.

SPEAKER_04 27:11

I think you're right. I now that you just said that, I I I think you're right. I think he got uh I yeah, I don't I don't think he went home the same. So um Wade, Paul, uh I absolutely support uh if you are listening to this and you're out in Ragbury and and you know, or a large group of people.

SPEAKER_00 27:33

If you're anywhere riding, yeah, be respectful, communicate because nobody knows other than you what you're doing, and you don't know what the people around you are doing. So if everyone just communicates with each other, we can eliminate a lot of these accidents.

SPEAKER_04 27:50

I uh definitely got a message from Keith today. He said, uh, thanks Adam. I'm in the second town so far. Uh he confirmed it was hot.

SPEAKER_00 28:04

So so what we've learned from all of our ragbri friends is it is hot in Iowa this week. It is hot. That's right. Well, it isn't much cooler down south in Kansas, so oh well.

SPEAKER_04 28:17

Oh well, uh we have smoke here. Uh we have uh lots of smoke, hazy smoke, and we had a clear day, but I understand it's coming back. So uh Taco Bell is uh taking claim for the lettuce, so hopefully we won't have any bathroom issues. Uh and but we did have a bunch of heat. I'm not sure if it's gonna return again soon, but uh it seems like it's always something. It is always something.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

Well, buddy, oh go ahead. Until tomorrow.

SPEAKER_03 28:51

Welcome to the