#13 The Race Room: Milano Sanremo 2026 debrief

The longest and most unpredictable Monument of cycling delivers once again. Milano–Sanremo isn’t about brute force, it’s about patience, positioning, and timing everything to perfection after nearly 300 kilometres in the saddle. From the early break to the decisive moves over the Cipressa and Poggio, this episode breaks down how the race was really won (and lost). We dive into tactics, sprint dynamics, and the fine margins that separate legends from the rest on the Via Roma. Whether it ends in a solo masterclass or a chaotic sprint, San Remo never disappoints, and this year was no exception.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Shift Podcast. I'm Caleb Ewan here with my co-host Jack Bennett. And today we are talking about Milano San Remo.

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Oh, and we've got a good two races to talk about. Some controversy uh in the men's and women's not controversy, but just some crazy things happened. And um yeah, can't wait. Play the intro music. Okay, Caleb, you are headed down to Melbourne uh on Saturday afternoon, I'm guessing you would have flown uh to do the commentary. Um, but you do the commentary for the men's, not the women's, and we're gonna talk about the women's first. We've caught up on it together. Um and yeah, the the race, it starts in Genoa, is it pronounced Genoa? Genoa, Genova. Genoa, yeah. Genoa. Um the two antagonists in the women's race uh who kind of pushed the pace on the Chepressa, which has now become you know the new Podgio. The new Podgio, correct. Uh Casia Newa Doma and Kim Le Court, Kim DeCourt. Um yeah, they animated it. They looked like they were gonna be the reason that their selection will be made, but then they both crashed.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

Yeah, they both crashed on the descent, but yet it it has seemed to become the the new Podgio, usually like the in the editions that I did, it was always like no one would ever attack there to go to the finish line. Whereas I feel like from last year when Poggy and Vanderpool and Ghana did it, everyone's kind of rethinking that you probably can attack there and go to the finish line. Yeah, but it's just it's such a hard climb to get away on because you're averaging 35, 36, 37 kilometres an hour. So crazy. You have such a big slip stream still. So for you to actually get away, you have to be doing so many more watts than the guy sitting on your wheel, or girl in this case sitting on your wheel. Um, it's actually such a tough climb to be able to ride away from the field.

SPEAKER_00 2:15

Yeah. Well, before they though after they did the Chopressa, we obviously saw that horrible crash on the descent. Um, some of the big favorites, and then a few other girls came down to it and went over the barricade, which that was scary. We actually had a message about this. Like, what do you do to stop that? And it's just I don't know. It's hard to say because I've never seen anything like that happen, and then it happened twice in the same race at the exact same spot.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

So yeah, um there's I mean, there's not much you can do to to change it because you I mean you can't barricade a full full course, no, you can't barricade every descent on every race either. Yeah, so I guess it's just riders need to know where their limits are, obviously know the course, know the descents, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Like on that's that kind of stuff, and like obviously it's a freak accident, but like the going towards a crash and pointing that direction, and like you know, because the first girl's obviously it's happened too, but the second girl's just ridden into the crash and then gone to the exact same side. So, like, yeah, that's just there's a little bit of user error there, but also just a freak accident.

SPEAKER_01 3:25

Um yeah, and it was it was a blind corner. So the girls from behind that were coming down, they wouldn't have known there was a crash. Oh, so they've just locked up the brakes, yeah. Where the crash was is basically on the race line, so there's really nowhere to go.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

Yeah, and I mean those girls that did crash initially initially, like Neil Doma, she's one of the best bike handlers in the in the women's paloton, so you can't put it down to that either. But anyway, they made their way from the Cheprest to the Podgio. Um, the main sort of antagonist was Puck Peters, um, from Phoenix to Koenig. She got a group of five away with two UAE girls, uh Dominic Waterchuk, who was one of the um girls that we see in a lot of Tour Down Under on the Climbs, uh Nomi Roog, uh Gasparini as well from UAE, and then Lotta Kapeki, who you know would have been one of the favourites, her or her teammate Lorena Weeber. So they had like a great sort of two-rider strategy there. Um and they sort of backed them the whole day, and you know, they they rode the front a lot, and it worked out pretty perfectly for them. They um because there was two UAE girls in that front group, um Waterchek just rode the front for the last two K's and essentially just gave Capeki a great lead out um you know in help trying to help her own teammate Caspar Gasparini, but um yeah, Capeki is one of the best in the world, if not the best, and you know, should they play the teammate card there or use the two girls to maybe try to break Kapeki or surprise her because Capeki was always going to beat them in the sprint, she's a much stronger sprint. I was thinking that I'm like, they're they're almost doing a leado here for third, like and they're lucky it wasn't fourth almost because the Gasparini only just rolled uh uh Peters, Puck Peters. So, like they almost did this beautiful leado, having two riders in the break, and then ended up with fourth and fifth, but they ended up with third and fifth. So, yeah, I think they probably should have done a bit of one-twoing, but I mean, in the heat of the moment in that situation, I guess all you're trying to do is stay away because that group coming from behind that had Ali Wallenstein and all Lorena Webers and all the main sort of the sprinters is hunting you down. So maybe if they won two, they all get caught. So it's it that's a that's a hard one, and you know, as you know after the podgeo, when you're going full gas and descending, not many things probably make sense in the writers' brains.

SPEAKER_01 5:53

Yeah, so yeah, huge win for Lodica Pekki at uh at her already very impressive Palmares. So she'll be very happy with that.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

And then yeah, we did see uh the bunch sprint led home by Lorena Weebers, no surprise there. Ali Wallinson come through for for six or seventh, seventh, because yeah, the bunch print was for for six. So congratulations to her. Obviously, riding quite well. She would have been sad to miss that front split, but that's like you know, the the the creme of the crop, that's the best riders in the world, so she's not far off it. But you watch the whole men's race, yeah. Which on Australian time is eight o'clock till three a.m. I didn't watch it. I've watched the highlights a few times, the extended highlights. I've listened to some potties about it, but I um yeah, maybe one of the best editions of this race ever, if not the best.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

I think it was probably in recent times or recent memory from from what I've seen was the most exciting Milan sunroom I've I've watched. Um but yeah, I I was commentating on it. It was from before the neutral till the very end of the race. So it was a it was a pretty prezzo. It was a pretty it was a pretty long day, to be honest. Um we started at 10 to 8, finished at quarter past three. So yeah, long day in the office. But it was a it was a very exciting race. For anyone that's watched Milan San Remo from the start to finish, they would know that 80% of the race is quite boring, not much happening at all. A lot of the riders are obviously trying to conserve energy and and things like that, but and we can talk about who who we thought were the favorites going into the race. Obviously, Poggy, Vanderpool, defending champion, Phillipson, who's won it two years ago, Pidcock.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Um I also think that like Ghana before the race, you would think Yeah, the last two years he's been right up there. He's been like a full contender, so this year was a bit of a funny one. Um, but yeah, like all the riders, Tom Pidcock's had some, he won Milano Torino during the week, obviously Poggy at Strada, Vanderpool on opening weekend, plus then at Toreno, like all these guys are showing their cards. Wout's been riding well. Mads has only just come back from injury, but he's Wout Van Art, so it's kind of hard to discount him ever. Um, so there's a lot of top guys, you know, the best of the best in cycling. They've all shown that they're in good form. Um and to be honest, the the result isn't surprising, but it's still crazy that he did it. Like, but would you have said he like would you have expected him to win before the race? I would have said it always would have been a possibility. Like it would have been him. I to be fair, I I couldn't see Vanderpal getting unhitched. Yeah, I I didn't imagine that would happen. Um, I mean a lot happened before that with the crashes and everything, but Poggy was affected too, where it was affected.

SPEAKER_01 8:56

So I just before the race, I just like you said as well, I just couldn't see Poggy getting that gap on Vanderpool. And in a sprint, Vanderpool's gonna beat him basically every time. So I was curious to see what the tactic would be to try to get the upper hand because you know I feel like he's almost tried everything now, and the race is almost a little bit too easy for him, and that was his biggest problem. Um but yeah, it's the other thing that I thought really didn't play into his favour was it was a headwind on the coast. And when there's a headwind on the coast, it slows everything down. The bunch rides slower, they go slower over the cappis, um, and obviously headwind on the climbs as well is gonna make it harder for him to get away. So I just think I just thought the kind of the conditions weren't great for him to be able to get away. He lost a teammate early, Jan Christian. Um, we didn't see the crash on TV, but he was out quite early. So he was already down to you know five guys to help him. He's missing Tim Wellens, he's missing Novaez. So two really, really crucial guys for him.

SPEAKER_00 10:14

Yeah, and we remember like the way that Tim wrote up the Podgio last year, or maybe was it was it the suppressor when he launched suppressor?

SPEAKER_01 10:20

I think yeah, it was kind of skits, like it was like Tim, then Novaez basically did a sprint for yeah 500 metres or yeah, however long it was, and then Poggy went after that. So it was just kind of like who's gonna be able to put that same pressure on as they put on last year, and even then last year he couldn't still couldn't get away. So he had kind of the odds stacked up against him, and I just thought it was gonna be you know, the the conditions just weren't good enough for him to do it. Really nice conditions at the start, like he started in Nixon jersey, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:51

Um I also think that like uh he would look like he was the most banged up from the crash, too. Like yeah, he went down so hard, yeah. Because like it didn't look like we would have any skin off him. Poggy was like shoulder, hip, rib, like everything scraped. The jersey was.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Well, he was the first to go down, yeah. So when you're the first to go down, usually you're the most hit and most injured because usually you hit the deck without being able to break. Um, at least when you're behind, you kind of have time to slow down a little bit. But yeah, he um he went down pretty hard. Uh but if we go back to the start, there was a breakaway straight away from the start, not really that contested. We had a few from Nova Nordisk, a few from uh Polti, a few from Barty Arni, Pulti and the new kit, too. The new old kit, which is kind of cool. Yeah, that was cool. And they they went left at a roundabout that they were supposed to go right at. So the initial breakaway went the wrong way. The bunch kind of followed them, and there was a whole bunch of confusion, and then the breakaway re-established itself again with new riders. I think there's maybe one or two from the original that got into the main breakaway of the day. Um, then that kind of established, and there's a few more riders from the same team that were already in the breakaway that tried to go across, and now Persin were like, no, we're happy with this size breakaway, so they shut it down, and that was the breakaway for the day. Um, and then we saw Sylvain Delier go to the front, and he was on his own on the front for 204 kilometers.

SPEAKER_00 12:20

That's not exaggeration. He literally just rode for 204k by himself on the front by himself, no one, not one turn from anyone else.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Wow, which is so impressive. It's crazy. He did the same last year, 200k stint on the front.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

How come no one from UAE goes and puts their name in the hat for a bit of a pull on the front, chop off with him?

SPEAKER_01 12:40

Well, I think it was Alperson's race to lose. Yeah. Because they had Vanderpool, who's the out and out favourite, and if it is too easy, they have Phillipson, who's the favourite if it comes down to a bunch of prints. So they've got two of the best cards to play. Um, so anyway, the breakaway went Dillier set in at the front, 204 kilometres, and then yeah, not much really happened. There was a little crash with Jan Christian, he was out of the race, but don't know exactly what happened there. Sometimes when you're just rolling along and switched off, um yeah, you might be cross over a wheel or something silly happens, but he was out of the race, so then it was even looking more unlucky for Poggy because that was one of his main guys to really make it hard on the climbs, yeah. Gone as well. So it wasn't really looking great for Poggy. Um we get down to the coast, and I say when you get down to the coast around Genoa is when the race really starts to slowly build up from Milan to Genoa, nothing really happens, and then you see everyone kind of having a break in Genoa, having a nature break, taking all their kids off, leg warmers, jackets off, and then it's kind of like the real race starts. Um and then we saw the breakaway in Genoa in the two-minute marks, somewhere like two minute and a half mark, and then it went out to six minutes 45. Wow. So I think there was a little bit of panic from UAE then, and then they sent a rider to the front. But then the thing is once the once the race starts kind of kicking off, you know, there's a lot of teams jostling for position, and that just forces the pace in the bunch, and the break basically comes back on its own. Um so yeah, not not that much happened. There was a big uh big crash, probably with about 70k to go, 65, 70k to go, really when the stress in the bunch was starting, and that was with Ineos. Um, we saw a few of their riders go down. They had a really strong team as well. Um so yeah, then that was really the let's say the start of the final before the f the three Cappies, and in the in the craziness, we saw uh Cuillado have a pretty nasty crash, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

Actually a horrible crash. Yeah, it looked really bad.

SPEAKER_01 15:08

He smacked his legs on that pole. Yeah, looked like he might have broken his legs, but reports are he's fine, no, no broken bones. So that's that's great to see. Um because you know he's uh an older rider now, and a lot of the time when there's older riders having crashes like that, they break a lot of bones. So good to see.

SPEAKER_00 15:29

And then obviously the recovery time's slower too, which is yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

But so it was great to see the from uh reports from Ineos that he is his fine just a bit bruised, a bit of skin off. Um so yeah, then we started the capis.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

Yeah, and I mean the cappis are nothing of note that I saw, but the chapras is where things really kick off.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Yeah, there's so nothing really happened on the cappis. They're if you were just riding over them, they're like nothing climbs. But after 250k, they're probably the first point in uh San Remo where you you really start to feel your legs. I get you. Um you you'll get to the cappis and you'll feel whether you're on a good day or a bad day. Um, because the rest of the the rest of the day is quite flat. So we went up the cappis again, not too much happened, a lot of jostling for position. One thing I noticed, and I was probably a little bit well, I was a little bit critical of um in commentary was Tom Pickcock was sitting right up the front, basically second team, or second wheel behind um Dillier, who was riding, and then when Novak of UAE took over, they were sitting second team, and Tom was probably sitting fifth wheel in the bunch, and I just feel like he was taking a lot of wind sitting there, whereas a lot of his rivals were sitting kind of mid-bunch or down the back of the bunch, basically not touching the not touching the wind at all. Um, and I just think firstly he's taking a lot of wind, and secondly, he's just showing his cards. He obviously felt good, and that's why he was sitting there, but um yeah, second wheel is like not that good of a sit. No, especially in a headwind, like there's a headwind on the coast, 20k an hour, so it's pretty strong. You obviously stay out of trouble being up there, so it is a bit more risky sitting back in the bunch, but you do save a lot more energy sitting back in the bunch. So I don't know if that was something that you know he obviously almost won the race, so maybe there was something in it, but um yeah, I just think he could have probably relaxed a little bit longer than he did. Um, so yeah, then we saw the you know, nothing too too crucial happened over the capis. And there was the race into Trapresa, which is probably the nowadays, especially because the the final move goes on Trappessa, is probably the most important point of the race.

SPEAKER_00 17:53

That's a that's a question that I have for you too, because now that Poggy has won, and I think you said in a post-race interview that he's done, like he's won, he doesn't need to come back each year. Do you think that Trapresa is the new turning point for the race, or is that just because of Poggy? Do you think like after this version, if Poggy doesn't come back, we go back to the Poggio being the turn point of the race, or do you think that it's adapted and now it is like that that's the the new where the race kicks off? I think it's always gonna like there's like Del Toro just replace him and they just do the exact same thing.

SPEAKER_01 18:27

It's it's always been a place where the race kicks off. There's always someone that goes, or there's always attacks there. It's not like they always just cruise up there, there's always something that happens. I just think Poggy's the only one to be able to get away from the bunch and stay away from there. I don't think there's anyone else that's capable of doing it.

SPEAKER_00 18:45

No, like even Peacock who's there without Poggy, he's not getting dragged along to do that, he's not doing that on his own.

SPEAKER_01 18:52

Yeah, you know, he's like you said, he he Peacock's on his limit on the wheel of Poggy, but Poggy's the one that's making that gap. So if Poggy's doing eight, nine hundred watts to get away, Peacock's maybe doing 650. But if Peacock's doing that 650 attacking, then whoever's on his wheels may be doing 450. I've just made those numbers up, but you know, like you get the point. Peacock can't put out the numbers that Poggy's doing to actually force the gap, but he's good enough to hold the wheel to go with the gap or to go with Poggy to make the gap. So I just don't think there's anyone in the bunch that has that capability that Poggy does to actually force a big enough gap that you can stay away from there to the finish line. Yeah, I get you. So if he doesn't come back, I I wouldn't expect to see a break from the Chepresa go all the way to the finish line again. I think we only will see that with Poggy in the race, or when someone you know comes along that's as punchy or as good as him. But there's no one in the bunch right now that I could think of that can can actually do that as well.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

Yeah. Um, okay, so they yeah, we see the Chepressor's kind of set up by McNulty dragging Poggy back, but at this point they're still kind of coming back from the crash, like yeah, so they crashed, it was probably 5k before Trappressor.

SPEAKER_01 20:20

And that period where you go through Imperial to the start of Trappressor is so fast, it's one of the hardest points of the races of the race. It's like guys are doing their final leadouts, their final pulls, race over for them, they're just going all out in trying to position their leaders into Trappressor. So it's so hard. Just to give an example, when I've done it before, I've hit the bottom of Trappressor, and my heart rate heart rate was 200 at the bottom before I even started to climb. So it's like a full gas sprint into the bottom. So when I saw Poggy down, I was like, It's over. Over. The chance of winning's over. Like, I would say almost impossible. Just because I know how fast it is from that point to the bottom. I knew he would probably be able to get back. But he's gonna be at the back of the bunch and be cooked. Yeah, gonna be at the back of the bunch, gonna be cooked. Um one thing though that I did think could come into his favour is that when the bunch did hit the bottom of Trepressor, who was actually gonna take it up and and make it hard? So, and we saw that everyone did the big race into the bottom, and then you could see the bunch kind of sit up and people kind of looking like, oh, I don't want to make it that hard. So that gave him the chance to get back onto the back and then get to get to the front reasonably quickly. Whereas if I think a team, if they went hard from the bottom treppessa, it would have taken Poggy a lot longer to get back to the front, and then maybe he wouldn't have had time to do his attack.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

Yeah, I understand. But it's true.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

To um for him to do Brendan McNulty did an amazing job taking him through the bunch and then they went straight to the front. He started, you know, this crazy tempo straight away. Del Toro was already there, and it was just kind of like all right, they're they're back in the race now.

SPEAKER_00 22:17

Yeah, and then Dol Del Toro gave him one last little undsa and launched him, and then it was just on.

SPEAKER_01 22:22

Yeah, yeah. So it was on three of them away. Peacock, Poggy, and Vanderpool. So very similar to last year, but Poggy was uh uh Peacock was replaced or replaced uh Ghana. And yeah, Peacock looks so good.

SPEAKER_00 22:40

Yeah, that's what I was about to say. He just he looked comfortable the whole time. Like I was almost expecting him to go over the top of Poggy at one point.

SPEAKER_01 22:47

Yeah, he looked he looked so good, and um Poggy he wanted them to come through, they rolled through with him, and then he attacked them towards the top, which I thought was a bit weird. Um, I think he should have probably stayed with them. He attacked him and he was flying down the descent. I don't know if you watched the descent, but he was distant like Vanderpool looks so uncomfortable on the descent.

SPEAKER_00 23:09

I mean, you could just see it in Vanderpol's face, he was just grimacing a lot and he just was hurting. I was surprised he came because he came through when they were they were chopping off. But did he crash?

SPEAKER_01 23:17

I don't know. I saw him coming back, but I don't I never saw him on the ground. But then a bit later on, I saw that he had like a bit of blood on his hand, so I don't know if he actually went down in the race or not.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

I'm gonna go through his tag and see if I can see any photos of him with blood.

SPEAKER_01 23:32

He definitely had some blood on his knuckle. Um, but I just I didn't see him on the deck at all. So I did see Phillipson was bringing up.

SPEAKER_00 23:43

There's a lot of blood on his hands in these photos. Can I have a quick look there?

SPEAKER_01 23:51

Oh yeah, he yeah, he crashed because you can see the skin off on the arm as well. So all right, so yeah, you know, he didn't look as good as he did last year, and that probably has something to do with the crash. Um, a guy like him is not gonna come back from the crash and get back to the bunch and be as fresh as a guy like Poggy doing the same kind of effort. So yeah, they uh they only had an eight-second gap at the bottom of the Poggio. So there's quite a big group behind them, mostly Lid Eltrek chasing behind. Um obviously, yeah, uh Mads Pederson, which he was uh he was having a very impressive ride, considering that he only yeah, it was his first first race back after his accident. So basically, this is his first race day of the year. Um so he was obviously feeling really good, and yeah, they hit the Poggio, three of them, and and Poggy went straight away.

SPEAKER_00 24:57

Yeah, like literally as soon as the road went up one percent, he just launched.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

He launched, and immediately you could see Vanderple was in trouble, the gap opened, but again, Tom looked like he was struggling a little bit, and he looked like there was potential that he was cracking, but Poggy just couldn't shake him.

SPEAKER_00 25:16

Yeah, I mean the thing I I don't know if you saw better footage than what I've seen in highlights and stuff, but it didn't look like he whacked it. Like, I mean, it just looked like he got to the bottom and just kept going hard, like he was already going hard, he just kept going hard. So, like Vanderpol kind of just looked like he got ridden off the wheel as opposed to like attacked. But I don't know if you saw it differently.

SPEAKER_01 25:37

No, he was he was attacking, he was like you could see he was out of the seat doing like a poggy kind of sprint.

SPEAKER_00 25:43

I'm just looking through all their tagged videos on Instagram because you get all these like iPhone videos, which is crazy because then it's someone standing on the side of the road whipping their iPhone as they go past and they're going uphill, and it looks like they're like racing around a crit course.

SPEAKER_01 25:56

There was one corner they almost didn't make the corner, like a sweeper. It was like it's unbelievable to see how fast those boys are riding up the hill. Um, so yeah, Poggy couldn't shake him. So going over the top, there was the two of them, and it was really tight. I think there was 20 seconds they had over the top. Um, still a big group behind, still a lot of riders with teammates behind. So they couldn't play around too much, they had to go down the descent quick and they had to work together once they got to the flat as well to stay away. So, yeah. I mean, what did you see from there?

SPEAKER_00 26:34

Um, I mean, I saw the initial surge from Pidcock on the descent, which was like kind of impressive, and then Poggy went past him, and then it looked like he was stretching him out, which is like, and you're like, oh, he might even drop him on the descent here. Like he was just jamming it out of the corner so hard. And as everyone knows, Pidcock is like, you know, quite commonly known as the best descender in the Peloton, if not one of. And I'm sure Poggy is like a fantastic descender, but just to see him absolutely put on his like descending limit, and then you gotta think because of that, he's not getting any recovery at all. Like, he's literally like going as hard as he can just to get back to the wheel. So that's there's something in that too. Um, maybe not like another reason why he just couldn't quite get over him. Like, but uh yeah, I just think Vanderpol, I do you know if he got caught by the bunch before the top of the climb?

SPEAKER_01 27:25

He would have had to get caught like on the top, on the top, okay. But uh one thing to mention as well, Poggy did a lot of recon in the past week of like I feel like he just did a recon of Trapresa and Poggio, and he was with a local writer, you know, Nicola Bonifazio, retired a few years ago, but lived in the region and he was like a maniac descender. I remember training with him there, and he was going around the hair pins on the front wheel, like crazy stuff. Um, and I think Poggy spent a little bit of time with him going down the descents, and I think I feel like Poggy was thinking, all right, if I'm going alone over the top of one of these climbs, I'm gonna maybe have a handful of seconds. So for me to really make the difference, it's gonna have to be on the descent as well. So I think he put a lot of emphasis on the on the descents and learning the descents, and you could see it in the race. He was you know, to to put guys like Pigcock and Vanderpool on the limit on the descent, you know you have to be going very, very quick. For sure. So I feel like he just no stone for him was left unturned this year. He was really all in.

SPEAKER_00 28:39

Um okay, so then they they get off the bottom of the Poggio descent, Pigcock and Poggy. Uh, does Pidcock roll a turn from there to the finish?

SPEAKER_01 28:48

Yeah, they they do swap off because they they they still only had a handful of seconds. Yeah, and then we saw Van Art attack the group behind.

SPEAKER_00 28:56

Yeah, did so I and again, this is another thing when you watch highlights like I have, you don't get to see as much stuff. But did he go at the base of the Podgeo?

SPEAKER_01 29:05

So they got off the Podgeo as a group, they went off the descent onto the main road in San Remo, and he's whacked the group from there. Yeah, okay. So he's whacked the group probably 2k to go.

SPEAKER_00 29:18

He actually said in an interview that that was his plan no matter where he was in the race. So, like if he was at the front, that was like their game plan. He was gonna do that if he was with the front group or if he was, you know. So that would have been interesting to see if he was with those guys. And I honestly think maybe he could have been without his crush because he seemed to wait way longer for his bike, and that chase seemed a bit harder. Um, so yeah, that's another if if if if what would have happened, but what did happen was uh they held the gap, poggy and Pidcock. Pidcock actually looked like you've seen him adjusting his skin suit and zipping up and moving around on the bike a lot on the on the second wheel. So you think this is a guy who's like not on like I mean he's obviously on his limit, but he's like not, you know, he's got a bit of composure.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

He never, yeah, he never looked like like he was really too much on his limit. He always looked pretty comfortable, and honestly, he he didn't put a foot wrong in the race, he did pretty much everything perfectly, maybe the sprint besides the sprint, a little like a little stuff up, but massive consequences. Um, and it was a a rookie, a real rookie error from him, and it honestly, I think it cost him the race. So, what we're talking about here is his second wheel behind Poggy, it's gonna be a two-up sprint between the two of them. He needed to lay off the wheel a little bit, give himself some space, initiate a meter or so, and the advantage that you have as being the rider behind is that you can surprise the rider in front of you. But he waited, he kind of like semi-started his sprint but let Poggy start. But the problem was he went on the right side of the wheel where the barrier was, so Poggy slowly closed that gap, and what Tom had to do was back his wheel out of there and go the other side and then start his sprint again. Yeah, but by the time he backed out and had to start his sprints again, there was only 50 metres to go, so he had no time to come back around. If he just started his sprints on the left and surprised Poggy, I think he would have won for sure.

SPEAKER_00 31:29

Yeah, there's that element of it, and then I also just think that like he shouldn't have waited for like he's just sitting there in the hot seat waiting and waiting, waiting. If he initiated, um, which a lot of people are scared to do, I think if he initiated that sprint, he was clearly just as good as him, if not better. He he would have got there first. But it's just like I guess there's so much fear when it's poggy, it's that you know, he's probably the greatest cyclist of all time, and you're sitting behind him, and like you said in the interviews afterwards, like if you said to him on the start line, today you come second behind Poggy, he takes it every day of the week. But then when you get to the line and you're that close, of course you're disappointed with second. Um and yeah, I just think if he took the initiative as opposed to waiting and waiting, he he would have won. Like, I I just think of like how Vanderpoel was sprinting at Toreno, where he was just on the front foot, you know, like not waiting for anyone, just doing his own thing and just having full confidence in his sprint ability. If Pidcock had that mindset, he he would have won, I think. But it's also poggy, you never know how. Like, if he came early, he would have just gone harder or faster or earlier.

SPEAKER_01 32:30

So yeah, I just think Peacock should have should have backed himself in the sprint. Yeah, it's a confidence thing. I backed him when I saw the two of them going for the line. I thought it was going to be close, but I thought Peacock did have the upper hand. And I just wonder maybe if Peacock had that same belief that he had the upper hand and he had that confidence going to sprint, he would have just backed himself and kicked a little bit earlier and surprised Poggy. Because I think if they got if he got beside Poggy and they went side by side, I think he is a little bit quicker. Um, but the whole fact that he had to kind of back out of his sprint and then start it again, there was just no time for him to come back around.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

Should we um and then Van Art held on for yeah, that was super impressive with a very fast finishing held on for third, a super fast finishing bunch, and in the end it was only four seconds on the line. Yep. So it really came no seconds between Van Art and the punch.

SPEAKER_01 33:31

Yeah, so it was such a tight race, and you know, it could have gone a lot of different ways, and and that's what what makes it so exciting, and that's what makes Milan San Remo so exciting is that you have such a big pool of riders that can actually win the race. Whereas if you go to Strada Bianchi, you have a pool of probably one guy that can win the race. Um, so yeah, it was uh it was a great addition, it was a great one to call as well. So yeah, exciting stuff. But we asked if anyone had any questions. We've got a few here. Jack, do you do you have them on hand or do I need to find them? We can find them together.

SPEAKER_00 34:09

Okay, so we got some questions. I'm just gonna pull one of them up now. Um, from who we got, here we got here we got on the shift. Oh, we've had some more come in since from Roberto Vukov Vukovic, um, question, Caleb, the runner-up in 2021, 16th in 2023, second in 2018, before the poggy era from Caleb's perspective, how did the race progress throughout the years? And compared to 2018, for instance, does the Chepressa attacking from Podic Car lift the rush and the stress? Is that does that make more stress, or is it more stressful to end up at the podgeo with a big bunch?

SPEAKER_01 34:54

I think it's more stressful going into the podio with a big bunch than a reduced bunch. Because you if you go with a reduced bunch, obviously there's less fighting for position, there's less, let's say, less tactics involved. But yeah, it's uh it's a completely different race to when I was second. Um both times you think? Yeah, yeah, for sure. Um there's no way a rider like me now would would get to the finish. It's just way too hard. Whereas it was hard when I was doing it, but it was, you know, there was a group of it's probably, I don't know, 80 guys getting over Depressor. Whereas now it's three guys getting over in the front, or that even that group behind is maybe 30 guys, 40 guys maybe. So it's a lot harder. I probably wouldn't even line up anymore with Poggy in the race. Yeah, wow. Um so yeah, it's a it's a completely different race now with a guy like him. So I wonder if it would be different I feel like it'd still be different if he wasn't there. The race would be raced completely differently.

SPEAKER_00 36:05

Okay, and then the next question we have. Do you think Wout Van Aert is again on top level to compete with Pog and Vanderpalet Flanders and Rubé? Or was it just smart tactics to take the third place? I think Wout Van Art is always at that level. He's just had so much bad luck, and I know that people will be critical and say, oh, you know, like someone like Poggy doesn't, but I know from first experience watching someone like Caleb Ewen that bad luck does, you know, can jeopardize year after year after year after year, and it's not the rider, like the rider still has their capabilities and their talent. Maybe some of that then affects their confidence level, which affects their ability to race as well. But I think something like that for Wout, you know, he did crash again today, again, more bad luck, but that third place will give him the confidence to go into uh Flanders, Rubet, um Ronde Van Deren. I think he's always gonna be good in those. They're like they're his style of races. He's won, he hasn't won a monument there. He's run the Rondi when him and Vanderpol had the two-up sprint. Um did he? Yeah, didn't he beat him in that when they had that two-up sprint? Not the actual Flanders, the the Rondi, the one before it. I swear he did.

SPEAKER_01 37:27

What's the Rondi that you talked about?

SPEAKER_00 37:29

Rondi von Vanderon. That is Flanders. No, well what's the what's the one the week or the day but the week before? There's two in Belgium. E3? No, no, no, no, no. I got confused. There's Flanders and Roubaix. Yeah, but yeah, but then there's one other big one the week before. Oh man. Well no. Let me have a look at that.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

Wellum E3, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 37:55

It's Duarsdorf Vladerin. Oh yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_01 38:02

Has Wout won Flanders?

unknown 38:04

No.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

I don't know if he's won a he hasn't won a monument, has he?

SPEAKER_00 38:07

No, he's only won Santa Remo. That's his only monument. Oh yeah, sorry. Yeah. Um Duarsdorf Landorin. And he's on the start list. So that's a good sign.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

Um, so going to the question, do I think I think Wout is in um his like he's back to his best form. But I just don't think his best form is good enough to compete with Poggy and Vanderpool, if I'm honest.

SPEAKER_00 38:34

I just think that like sometimes he has these days where it is, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:39

I think with without Poggy in the race, yes. But again, Vanderpool is strong enough to keep up with Poggy, but he's not strong enough to do the same attacks as Poggy. So Poggy's able to do those those efforts on the front, and let's just call it a thousand watt effort. Let's say Vanderpool's able to do the 800 watt effort it takes to stay with him, but that's his max effort. So if Poggy's not there, Vanderpool does the 800 watt effort, and whoever's on his wheel is doing the 600 watt effort. And I think a guy like Wout Van Art can stay with him in that scenario. But Wout Van Art, I don't think, can do the 800 watt effort it takes to stay with Poggy.

SPEAKER_00 39:22

I get you. I pick up what you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

That's I just I think those two are on a different level when it comes to racing like that. But I would love to see Wout back at his best. It was great watching um him, Alaphilip, and Vanderpool going for it a few years ago. Um, but yeah, he's had some bad luck. He's had you know some bad crashes. Horrible crashes. Yeah, some some really bad crashes. So of course that all all that stuff affects you. And you know, he even had a bad crash in the cyclocross season this year. I think he broke his ankle, so he's come back from that already again now. Um, so I just hope that you know the bad luck stops from him for him. And yeah, for any athlete, I think winning gives you the confidence that you need, and sometimes you just need to crack that win and um you're on a roll again. So hopefully we'll see it. I'd love to I'd love to see Wout back at his best.

SPEAKER_00 40:23

Lucky last one. Do you think it's possible for Poggy to win Roubaix?

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 40:31

I think Roubaix is one of those races where anything is possible because it's Roubaix. You know, he can definitely be there with Vanderpol, he can be there with Van Art, he can be there with Mads. Um, just getting straight ridden off the wheel is gonna be pretty, pretty hard. And then just knowing the lottery of Rubé and what it's like, it's so possible that you know, if he's with Vanderpol, Vanderpol could crash or puncture, or we've seen it so many times in Rubé. Anything can happen. Like, look at Matt Heyman winning. Um, and Matt Heyman is pretty unfair comparison to Tade Pagatcha.

SPEAKER_01 41:05

So yeah, and I just I think for Tade to win, I think Vanderpool has to have some bad luck. Puncture at a bad time, a crash at a bad time. Because I just don't see Poggy riding Vanderpool off the wheel on a flat set of cobbles. No. Um, and then if they take if they go to the line together, I find it hard to see uh Poggy beating Vanderpool in a sprint. And then you've got other guys like Mads Pederson who's obviously in good good form as well, and that's only gonna progress as we get towards Roubaix as well. So it's gonna be it's gonna be really hard for him. And I think this is Roubaix is gonna be the one that he's gonna find the most difficult to win. Um but sometimes if you just have a race where you don't have any bad luck, it's enough to win as well when you've got legs like that. So it's gonna be, you know, he's gonna have to have some good luck, he's gonna have to have some of his rivals have bad luck, and then I think he's he's definitely one that can obviously win the race. He was second there for the first, you know, he only has done it once. Um, so he finished second in his first time. So he would have learnt a lot from last year, and yeah, I mean we'll see what happens. It's gonna be a really exciting race to watch anyway.

SPEAKER_00 42:25

Yeah, I'm just reading Poggy's post about it. Um, it says at the end, and Urshka, I promise I will stay away from those roads for a while now. So maybe that is him saying no more San Remos.

SPEAKER_01 42:38

Well, I think he was spending a lot of time in San Remo, like doing the descents and everything. Yeah, right. I saw a lot of posts from him in San Remo in the past two weeks. Got one question here from David Miller.

SPEAKER_00 42:53

The David Miller.

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Yeah, he said, Would he have won the race without the crash? I'm not sure. Reading reports how now Matthew Vanderpool was battered, so in a way it eliminates MVPD, but at the same time, only Podjakar could do the impossible like that because crashing five kilometres before Trappessa and winning was considered impossible. So, did the crash, that crash, help him win the race?

SPEAKER_00 43:23

I mean, you're probably like you kind of touched on this earlier that it's like only like Van Art coming back from that crash, Van der Paul coming back from the crash, they're gonna come back and be not cooked, but they're gonna have burn a match. And Poggy's got way more matches than everyone else. So it's like okay, maybe without the crash, Van Der Paul can hold the wheel, Van Aert's there, then you have this race of you know, four guys coming to line. Maybe it's a completely different race.

SPEAKER_01 43:55

But if Van Aert and Vanderpool come to line with Poggy, they're beating him every time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

But if is the word here, and it doesn't really matter what if happened because um he won and we nothing's gonna reverse that now. So yeah, I mean it if he doesn't race it next year, it sucks because the person who does win will always be like, Well, if Poggy was there, Poggy could have won, you know what I mean? Um, which isn't you know, you want to beat the best guys, um, but yeah, I mean, you just look at what Poggy does in a year compared to a lot of the other guys, like a Remco, like a you know Vinegarde, especially, like you know, they're such you know, they specialise in what they specialised, and maybe this will affect doing all these races will affect his Tour de France ambitions. Um so maybe he and you know, we did see a very tired poggy at the Tour de France last year, even though he was so dominant, it was more in the media sense, you know, you could see that he didn't want to be there as much. So maybe giving himself a bit more time in the the early part of the season to not do those things that will give him longevity at the Tour de France. Maybe he won't want to do the Tour de France, who knows? But I just think that like he's making very long seasons for himself, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

But in saying that, he's done two race days this year, which is way less than any of his competitors. This is true, and he only started three weeks ago, yeah, or two weeks ago, yeah, true. Um but he's expected to win Strado Bianchi from the start, and he's expected to win Lombardia at the right at the end of the season and everything else in between. So I think it's a bit of it's a smart approach for him to go Stratobian, no terreno or Paris Nice, straight to San Remo, and then I don't think he'll he'll then he'll probably do Flanders and then Roubaix. So we'll get to May and he'll only have four race days. Then he'll do probably a Dolphin A or something in June, and then the Tour de France. So he's probably only starting the Tour de France with 15 race days.

SPEAKER_00 46:04

Yeah, I guess I guess you are right, it's just the intensity and like the variation in the racing, as opposed to Remco, like Remco's racing Catalunya this week, for example. But like these are all like stepping stones and training, like you know, it's all like part of his process.

SPEAKER_01 46:20

Yeah, I mean Remco's probably got as many race days right now at this point in the season than Poggy will have at the start of the Tour de France.

SPEAKER_00 46:27

Yeah, well, he's ridden Valencia and UAE tour, so you already have 15 days or something.

SPEAKER_01 46:33

Yeah, so um, yeah, you know, those guys don't have to worry about doing the classics like Poggy. I think will Poggy do Liege? That will be an interesting one. I want to see him and Remco go head to head in the Rden's classics.

SPEAKER_00 46:47

Yeah, that's like I'm just I'm just on the start list for it, but they normally I think the big question for Poggy this year is that he's on the start list and so is Remco already, so that's sick. Um the big question this year is will Poggy do the Velter? Because he hasn't won all three grand tours yet. On his PCS right now, we currently have the Flanders, Rubet, Liège, Romandie, Tour de Suisse, Tour de France. Nothing else, but that that's just because they haven't released the rest of his year because there's no world championships or anything on there right now. And I I know he'll ride the world championships in Canada. He's in the ad for it, so all right. Well, I mean, that's a uh it's you could talk about it for a long time, and especially like there's a lot of racing coming up, so we're obviously gonna be back on here. Um, but yeah, congratulations to a lot of Capeki, congratulations to the Pog. One other thing I haven't that this is I just quickly last last one from me. Do we think Tom Pidcock's now at the level where he kind of has supposed to have been for the last few years? He's kind of been there or thereabouts, maybe he's put too much energy into mountain biking. But I think Pidcock's had this expectation where you know he could be a monument man, he could be winning some of the biggest races in the world. He hasn't quite done that yet, other than obviously what he's done on the mountain bike, which has been super impressive. Do you think that this sort of proves that you know that level of rider expectation is deserved and that he can win some of these big races? Because I do.

SPEAKER_01 48:23

Yeah, you know, he's he's had a lot of um talk of the potential to be, like you said, a monument man or going for GC in grand tours, winning monuments, winning races like Lie Age, winning races like Milan Son Remo. Um, but he just hasn't quite been able to deliver on them. Um, but the last two seasons he's looked really good. Um, and I think this year, watching him now at Milan San Remo, yeah. I mean, like we were saying before, he just looked so comfortable the whole time. It was just that minor mishap in the sprint that cost him the race, I think. So yeah, I think he's he's at the level that um we all want to see him at, and he's at the level to hopefully challenge a guy like Pog like he did yesterday. So yeah, hopefully we see that more and more now into the into the classics, and that brings another element in and another rider that can maybe compete with Pog as well. And um, that's what we want to see. That's what what makes races interesting is having multiple riders there that can win and not just one rider that dominates all the time.

SPEAKER_00 49:28

Yeah, it's nice to see Poggy have competition as opposed to just like pure domination. But yeah, I can't imagine we're gonna see like the the competition. I mean, at Flanders there'll be some competition. Um, and that's that's one of the best races of the year, so I'm excited for that. But yeah, that's uh the shift podcast. Thanks for tuning in, everyone, and we'll uh probably speak to you next week at some point.

SPEAKER_01 49:49

Yeah, thanks for listening, everyone.

SPEAKER_00 49:51

Goodbye.