This week we cover the results from Sweden with the Vargarda Team Time Trial, and the Road Race. We also have an interesting diversion into how the calendar shift of this race has changed the way it’s raced and the results. Ella CyclingTips this week had a really interesting interview with Leah Thorvilson, the Canyon-SRAM rider who was the winner of last year’s Zwift Academy. We discuss that interview and the broader impact of Zwift Academy on the sport, especially interesting as the second year of the program is due to start in September. As always, lots more fun, laughter and Australian weather updates included! (47:28 MIN / 43.50 MB)
This week we catch up on the Prudential Ride London GP, which was surprisingly held in London this year. We also cover the full results for Juniors, Under23s and the Elite Women at the European Championships in Denmark. We’ve got a great block of live races coming up with Vargarda and then the Ladies Tour of Norway, GP Plouay all coming up. There’s heaps to get across along with all the usual hilarity, swearing and awesomeness! (1:00:34 MIN / 55.47 MB)
This week we follow up on the second race from La Course by Le Tour de France; the chase held on the weekend with the top 19 riders from the Col d’Izoard stage raced it out on the streets of Marseille. We talk through the excitement and also the issues that this new format of race revealed. There’s positives and negatives, we take our time with both and also explore ways that we think the format could be improved for the future. (53:56 MIN / 49.39 MB)
Look, we do understand that not all weeks can be huge weeks of racing, but honestly this week was definitely a HUGE week of racing. We had stage racing at the BeNe Ladies Tour in the Netherlands and Belgium. We also had the Lotto Thuringen Ladies Tour in East Germany. With races suiting different types of riders and different types of racing there was no shortage of surprises and feats of phenomenal prowess to be impressed by. All of that before we get into the high mountains for the Col d’Izoard and La Course by Le Tour de France. We also quickly cover some Canadian racing and talk about a couple of other news items from the week. (1:03:46 MIN / 58.39 MB)
The Giro Rosa has finished for 2017 but we’re far from done with it. With great racing every day, it’s perhaps best summed up by Neal Rogers talking about Lucinda Brand when he said: “Only thing more badass than “no one in the photo”? No one in the photo with blood trickling down your arm”. Sarah and Dan recap the biggest stage race on the calendar and all of the highs and lows the second week of racing brought us. After that they continue with the overview on the Tour de Feminin in Poland before wrapping up with some quick results in other disciplines and a glimpse of the calendar ahead, and in 2018. (1:00:00 MIN / 54.94 MB)
The biggest women’s cycling stage race, the only women’s Grand Tour. Catch up with our podcast about stages 1-6, including links to the posts of each stage’s videos, photos and media. And for the rest of the race:
If you want to find out a bit more about some of the people who make the media that help us follow the race, Sarah’s podcast interviews with Rose Manley, who makes the videos on the UCI YouTube, and with Vélofocus, aka Sean Robinson and Balint Hamvas, who take the amazing photos.
And here’s the Neal Rogers tweet about Lucinda Brand’s stage win:
We’re at the halfway point through the 2017 Giro Rosa with five stages completed. We cover each of the stages so far, from the opening TTT through to the ITT and all the travails and changes on GC in between. There has been more than a fair share of surprise Giro geomorphology including some truly brutal climbs and so on. An incredibly close sprint finish and more. There’s lots to cover and lots more to speculate on as we continue into the second half of the stages. (Spoiler Warning: We do actually cover the end of stage 6 so bail out early if you don’t want us to reveal the winner for you). (1:06:11 MIN / 60.69 MB)
This week we talk through the events in China at the Tour of Chongming Island. We catch up on Marianne Vos’ first win of the season. We take a look at the Women’s Tour of California (aka The Breakaway From Heart Disease Women’s Race presented by SRAM). We catch up on the latest news from BMX and we take a few minutes to reflect back on the last five years of podcasting. That’s right, it’s our FIVE YEAR ANNIVERSARY EPISODE! There’s plenty of good things (and a couple of things that induce ranty swearing) to remind ourselves of. There’s even time to play the “if I had a time machine and were insanely rich how would I help the sport” game (the rules are easier than the name). So strap yourselves in and enjoy! (54:57 MIN / 53.01 MB)
As usual, the post below includes things we talked about this week, but also videos, articles and links to things we didn’t get around to.
Difficult to avoid a sprint, but then got a perfect lead out by my teammates @WM3ProCycling. Thanks! Very happy I could finish off the work. https://t.co/6Ame8B2Wzd
60 enthousiaste kinderen fietsten vanmiddag mee met de Marianne Vos Wielerclinic. Bovendien mochten ze Marianne ook nog interviewen! pic.twitter.com/t0dwmXK63T
— gemeente Aalburg (@gemeenteaalburg) May 10, 2017
Today @marianne_vos did a recon for this weekend's race together with 70 local school children. Great to see her inspire the youth to ride 👍 pic.twitter.com/AstpmfWDmL
Iurreta-Emakumeen Bira, 17th-21st May, Spain, UCI 2.1. The last stage will be streamed live, maybe with daily highlights too and I’ll tell you how to watch nearer the time. Follow the excellent race twitter and the #Bira hashtag (that also has lots of photos of beer in it!).
If you want to talk to us about anything in this week’s podcast, or women’s cycling in general, leave us a comment, below, or tweet us: Sarah is @PWCycling and Dan is @DanWOfficial.
Big thanks to all of my Patreon supporters, who fund me to do all my women’s cycling work, including these round-up posts. You can join them here.
This week we cover the results from Sweden with the Vargarda Team Time Trial, and the Road Race. We also have an interesting diversion into how the calendar shift of this race has changed the way it’s raced and the results. Ella CyclingTips this week had a really interesting interview with Leah Thorvilson, the Canyon-SRAM rider who was the winner of last year’s Zwift Academy. We discuss that interview and the broader impact of Zwift Academy on the sport, especially interesting as the second year of the program is due to start in September. As always, lots more fun, laughter and Australian weather updates included! (47:28 MIN / 43.50 MB)