The Time-Crunched Cyclist Podcast by CTS

TDF Femmes Podcast - Stage 7 & Physical Demands at the Front vs. the Grupetto

• CTS • Season 5 • Episode 265

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Welcome to the Tour de France Femmes Podcast, from the producers of "The Time-Crunched Cyclist Podcast"
CTS publishes daily Tour de France Femmes podcasts with Coaches Adam Pulford and Renee Eastman. They recap the stages, but the unique aspect of these podcasts will be coaching insights about how athletes prepare for the demands showcased in that day's stage. 

STAGE 7 PODCAST OVERVIEW
Stage 7 of the 2025 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift was another significant climbing day, meaning there was a hard-working breakaway, fireworks in the GC group, and a bunch of riders in the grupetto looking to save their legs for another day. Coaches Renee Eastman and Adam Pulford recap the stage and talk about the Training Stress Score (TSS) differences between the front and the back, plus the hows and whys of pro women racing multiple disciplines (i.e., road, cross, mtb), and look forward to the Queen Stage of the TDFF tomorrow.

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Co-Host: Renee Eastman

Renee Eastman is a CTS Premier Level Coach and has been coaching with the company for more than 20 years. She has been a professional bike fitter for 15 years and was one of the first fitters to use the Retül bike fit system. She has a master's degree in exercise science, has worked for USA Cycling, and is a 6-time Masters National Champion.

Renee Eastman bio: https://trainright.com/coaches/renee-eastman/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/renee.eastman/

HOST
Adam Pulford has been a CTS Coach for nearly two decades and holds a B.S. in Exercise Physiology. He's participated in and coached hundreds of athletes for endurance events all around the world.

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Speaker 1:

What up fans, and that is Time Crunch fans, tdff fans and Maeva Squibben fans. I'm your host, coach Adam Pulford, and alongside me is the best co-host in the biz, renee Eastman. What up, renee?

Speaker 2:

Good morning, adam. Great to be here. Nice to see your lovely face again this morning. Welcome listeners.

Speaker 1:

Likewise listeners. The high performance director on EF, oatly Cannondale, and here is a quick voice message that she sent me over last night and I will let everybody know that it does drop out halfway through. We'll talk about that, but that is part of the chaos of the Tour de France Femme, avec, zwift. So let's hear from Emma Trott now.

Speaker 3:

Hello, I'll do a voice note just because it's easier and I can actually do other things while I'm talking. So, from a team perspective, we're getting better day by day, which was always a little bit our plan and our mission. The tour is very much. It's a back heavy in terms of well, I suppose, the elevation gain, but also how hard the race is. It's patience, I suppose. In general, everything is going okay. Riders are still, I want to say, alive. There's always should be the first step right.

Speaker 3:

Everyone's everyone is committing to the plan and their job. I am super happy with what we've achieved so far. Being present in a couple of breakaway days, maybe we didn't get the end result that we then desired, but the girls are committing to the plan. Everyone is recovering well so far, which is pleasing. We've got some nice recovery strategies in place that all the girls are committing to. Now it really is just. It really is as simple as we have to do the basics. It sounds very cliche, but I think this is where, particularly on today's stage, making sure they're eating and drinking, even if they're in the grupetto or wherever they are it's crucial. If they're not doing that, then for sure we lack energy at some point, and that's the moment that we need the energy. Everyone's got a role to play on this team, whether they're AJ setting up at the beginning.

Speaker 2:

Adam, I don't know about you, but she sounds tired. I mean we know the athletes are tired, but the staff is busting butt all day long, 16 plus hour days. I know what it's like on the team side of things, but staff's tired too. We know the riders are tired. Have you heard any updates from Allie?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean, it is hard to keep a good Canadian down, renee. So I chat with Allison post stage every day, kind of a mix of WhatsApp text messages, voice messages and some quick calls. Uh, kind of a mix of WhatsApp text messages, voice messages and some quick calls. She's enjoying herself, Like she's having a great time. Uh, she's. Yeah, I mean, she's doing what she loves to do, which is riding her bike at the biggest stage, and, uh, doing what she loves to do.

Speaker 2:

Well, I saw uh Allie's Instagram post I don't know if it was yesterday afternoon or this morning um that, uh, yesterday, stage six, she took the day off in the groupetto. If you guys aren't familiar with that groupetto term, that just means the ladies who are just trying to finish inside the time cut. These are riders who maybe have different roles on the team and maybe they don't have a specific role that day. They're taking it easy so they can be productive later in the race. Or maybe somebody like Wiebes, who had no shot at coming in today, taking it as easy as they can, but it's not really easy, though, and we'll get to that later.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so you know to talk about some of that, like the tactics of the groupetto and a little bit more on AJ is. I mean she is getting tired, just like anybody else. It is a very hard race. She's been in the brick a couple stages that we've talked about now. Hard race she's been in the brick a couple stages that we've talked about now and some of her role is as team captain.

Speaker 1:

She's a worker bee but she's also coaching the riders on her team and also trying to make the right political move with the other riders in the Peloton to form and shape it kind of the way she wants to.

Speaker 1:

So how that works is some of her roles on the team is lead out for the sprints on key stages that there is a sprint and so working for Noemi, the sprinter on her team, and then also lead outs into key hill climbs for their GC rider, kerbal, and so just to position her well and save Kerbal energy going into the climbs.

Speaker 1:

And then once because AJ is not a GC rider or a specialty hill climber, then her day is essentially done If it's just like mountains after that. So on a stage like yesterday when I was looking at her file, the front half essentially of the day was a lot of like high tempo, like normalized power, with a lot of anaerobic surges on off and like some big deep digs and then she'll get back into the Peloton and then again hits that long hill climb and she'll have to ride, you know, hard to get up and over that. But after that it was kind of an easy endurance or recovery ride going back in and what she said was like yeah, I had to tell some of the girls in the group pedo to just like slow down. We have plenty of time, we don't have to like flog ourselves going into the finish line.

Speaker 2:

So the intention on that group pedo is to chill out because you know the next day they'll have a bunch of duties early on in the race and you got to save energy for that so, adam um, can you give me, give us and me some contrast on what a day in the group pedo the like day off looks like, versus like we know ally was in the break the day before in in five. What's a day off like?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'll pull up her training peaks right here and I actually didn't look at this ahead of time to play off the TSS and stuff like that. But let's go back actually to stage three, when she was off in the break on stage the, the total TSS on the day was 331 Watts for just under four hours of racing. And then the next stage where she kind of sat in, had her team duties and and, but overall kind of easy did the whole group pedal thing is 194 TSS and just over three hours of racing.

Speaker 1:

Now stage five, when she was in the break, again like wrestling the bike like we talked about, right, like digging deep commitment has consequences 337 TSS, total, uh, about over four hours of of racing. And then, um, yeah, yesterday, uh, when she had that group had a worked hard in the front, half chilled out, in the second half, 270 TSS. So you can see that contrast of when you go, the stresses and strains are definitely big and so when you get the opportunity to chill out and kind of coast in, if you can and still make the time mark, then you do it.

Speaker 2:

Adam, I know one of my friend's moms is listening to this podcast it Adam? I know one of my friend's moms is listening to this podcast. Can you just really briefly say what TSS is and what, on the scale, 300 is versus 200?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Training Peaks has done a great job of helping us coaches and riders be able to quantify intensities and stresses and all that kind of stuff. So a training stress score, or TSS, is a number that is assigned to how hard something was on the day, and so the way it works is we have a threshold that we determine that when the point at which a rider starts to get more tired, that intensity we mark as their threshold, and then when you go out and ride your bike, you get points. You get these TSS points, and so those TSS points rack and stack with how much riding you're doing at FTP or above FTP or below FTP, and then for however long you ride. So essentially you get points for every minute that you're riding.

Speaker 1:

That's TSS, and the harder it is or longer it is, the higher the TSS. So some, for you know, let's just say, for a rider at this level, you know, uh, tss scores and training of you know kind of 100 to 200, pretty normal, kind of. You know, 200 is big training day, but 150 pretty normal. Uh, now, when we go into racing and we start to see two, 50, 300, um, that's a bigger day when we're maybe like three 50 and above, you're going to have performance uh decrements the next day. It's harder to recover within 24 hours right around three 50, I would say.

Speaker 2:

Let me put it even in like plainer language, please. You know, if you ride as hard as you can, like absolutely full gas, as hard as you can, for an hour, you get 100 points.

Speaker 1:

If your FTP is set properly, yes, Correct.

Speaker 2:

If you just go out for an easy cruise endurance ride, you know, not pushing it too hard, that might be 50 points. You know, maybe you're doing some intervals a little bit harder ride for that might be 50 points. Maybe you're doing some intervals a little bit harder ride, for that hour 70 points. So that's kind of the scale 50 to 100 points for really hard ride at 100 or kind of easy endurance ride at 50, recovery ride at 30, maybe 20.

Speaker 1:

So if she's scoring 300 plus points, that is six times harder than your hour long ride. And let's put it in simple terms too If I went and rode my bike and I scored 330 TSS points, I do not want to ride my bike the next day, personally.

Speaker 2:

And so, anyway, I think the point is she is working much harder on those breakaway days, and when she's taking it easier, it's still pretty hard, it's just a little easier, right.

Speaker 1:

But that's again why we try to bring a rider in super, super fit. We use volume in all intensities to get that done. But we want to build the resilience and the durability and build the aerobic capacity so that when we enter in a you know, a grand tour, uh, stage race, you've, you've got the bandwidth to, uh, you know, come back, you know, recover and come back the next day and do it all over again and do whatever the team needs to do, uh, in her case.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, well, thanks, adam. Uh, should we get onto the stage summary?

Speaker 1:

Let's get on with it, because again I I rode my bike, uh uh, this morning to for an hour, hit the mountain bike and they had a couple of phone calls, so I joined with about an hour and 15 minutes of racing to go something like that 50K. So, renee, give us the recap and tell me everything that I missed and tell our listeners what's up.

Speaker 2:

Sure, adam. Today was another mountain stage. It was pretty long 160K, about a hundred miles. The first half was pretty flat but the back half was where all the climbing was stacked. The main feature of the day was the Category 2 Col de Grenier. It topped out with about 20K to go to the finish. My window watch alert for today. It's a watch the last 25K You're going to get all the best action of the race.

Speaker 2:

The day started with another huge breakaway. Now that we're a little deeper into the race you're seeing these bigger breakaways, like yesterday, like today, because now there's more people who've lost more time that the GC riders aren't concerned about so they can give them plenty of leash. Another strategy with that is placing satellite riders up ahead and I'll get to that. I'll circle back on that as we're going along. I was actually pretty excited on the break. We had three Americans in the group of 17 break American Chloe Dygart from Kamiya SRAM, megan Jabstrab from Picnic Post L and Ruth Edwards from Human Powered Health Corrections Corner. I called Ruth by her maiden name the other day, so sorry.

Speaker 1:

Ruth. Easy to do, in fact, real quick. I had a rider in Colorado looking up a hill climb that she was going to do this coming Saturday and she was like, oh, ruth Edwards has the QOM. And I'm like in my head, I'm like Ruth Edwards, I'm like oh yeah, of course, her maiden name was Winder. Winder yeah, yeah, that's how we come up, I still think of her as that, yeah, totally so. Yes, I had the same moment the other day.

Speaker 2:

Fun fact about all of those Americans they are part of a medal-winning team pursuit program at the Olympics for the US, of course. Program at the olympics, uh, for the us, of course. Um another rider that was in the break, mava squibbin, yesterday's stage winner, um adam, I guess she wasn't too tired after yesterday's 30 kilometer solo I.

Speaker 1:

You know what I'm a. I'm a big mava fan. Now, in fact, I got a little mad because I was rearranging my fantasy Tour de France of X Zwift team last night and I almost put her on my team and I didn't, because I thought she'd be tired and she wasn't. So, shepo, yeah, mava.

Speaker 2:

The biggest gap they had was about four and a half minutes as they were starting to get into the climbs with about 50 kilometers to go. When the climb started to come, and just as they hit more and more climbs, the break just got smaller and smaller and smaller, until it was just it was Ruth and Chloe and Squibbin and somebody from Movistar. Those were the last four left from the break, so Chloe and Ruth crushing it. Today she was digging deep.

Speaker 1:

If you saw some of the camera. I mean she was like in the hurt locker for sure, and it's it's it's a rare occasion when she is. But also those who were like can we talk about AJ's bike fit and whatever? Go watch Chloe Diger. Some of the best in the world like wrestling her bike to keep up with uh, ruth and and Squibben, so I just just saying, when you go hard, put a camera on yourself and see what's up.

Speaker 2:

Uh, I'm going to humble Brad. Okay, I took the QOM on the top half of Cheyenne Canyon and then Chloe came back the next day and got at me by like 10 seconds.

Speaker 1:

When was that?

Speaker 2:

Back when I was fit. That was a few years ago. All right, let's focus. Um, okay, uh, so those last four left from the break and squibbin, once again showing her form, attacks with a few kilometers left to go of the final climb. And you guys got to remember the final climb, topped out with about 20 k's to go almost all downhill to the finish, something that I thought was a bit of a surprise. Today. We expected some gc action and uh, kim la court got dropped as the gc favorites were coming up. Squibbins off the front there's a few breakaway riders in between and uh, uh, the gc group just started, you know, pushing the pace. It wasn't really anybody attacking, it was just a pace. Uh, look, the court got dropped. Um, the gc group goes over the top squibbins already on the descent and we saw yesterday I, I noticed yesterday she is a very good descender.

Speaker 1:

She's like the double threat Good uphill and good going downhill on their downhill capability because as the competition elevates, that's another area where they can improve. So no longer can you just be good at climbing, you need to get good at descending to the point where they're hiring downhill mountain bike coaches to get better at descending.

Speaker 2:

Yes, and we're going to talk about the descent Over the top, squibbins ripping it up, but safely. She's just really good and fast. She wasn't taking any risks that I saw. She went on to win again Back to back days. There are only a few riders who have even won two stages of the tour and they are names like Annemiek van Vleuten and Demi Ballerine and Marlon Rousser. So this is so exciting. I was texting with our French coach companion there.

Speaker 1:

Firecracker, the French firecracker.

Speaker 2:

French firecracker, and she was just like Viva la France, you know, this morning, that's Caroline Manning, by the way I expected fireworks from the GC group. There was none, but I noticed Demi got to the front and I think she did that to control the pace I was going to say.

Speaker 1:

The one thing that I did notice was Demi was going for it.

Speaker 2:

Well, but she wasn't ripping. She's a very good descender, but she was controlling the pace and I think that's why spoiler alert LaC la court caught back up by the end of the descent, so okay, so you're saying dami came to the front to more or less control I, I thought she came to the front.

Speaker 1:

Be like man, we need to get as many seconds as we can. So I'm going to come up and do stuff, but you're saying controlled it, maybe slowed a little bit and look it didn't look that aggressive.

Speaker 2:

I mean, nobody's wheels were sliding out in the corners like we had seen with kerbal and cassia the last couple days cassia got a little close to uh.

Speaker 1:

Um, damien, at one point.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it was they almost overlapped um, so that was my take on it you know, interesting. So because LaCorte was about 30 seconds going over the top, 30 seconds behind the GC group, so she caught that up. So that means she ripped the descent.

Speaker 1:

I was blown away by that. I didn't think that that was going to happen.

Speaker 2:

Neither did I, I didn't. And you were talking about descending and we've been talking about teamwork. I mentioned satellite riders and you were talking about descending and we've been talking about teamwork. I mentioned satellite riders. A satellite rider is you go put somebody in the breakaway to be able to help your GC leader later in the day, because maybe it's somebody like AJ no-transcript teamwork, an example of how that plays out. And I know Sarah's been working on her descending quite a bit and she previewed all the routes and in particular the descents.

Speaker 2:

So let's move on and you know, catch up on the finish. Amazing ride by Ruth Edwards to hang on for podium spot in third. She was between Squibin and the GC group. So yay, america. And actually one person from the GC group slipped off towards the end of the scent and that was Kerbal. She kind of ripped the end of the scent and she got a little bit ahead of the GC group. Those two only finished about 10 seconds or so ahead of the GC group. Those two only finished about 10 seconds or so ahead of the GC group. So Cabal got a couple of seconds in second place. Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Cause Cabal like sprinted to the line. She, she had a good little snap at the end.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I was rooting for Ruth. It was close, I'd spike through. Yeah, cabal caught Ruth with I don't know 500 meters to go. Not, yeah, kerbal caught Ruth with I don't know 500 meters to go Not very much to go, and at the end losing the jersey. I had been typing up my report, like PFP, is in yellow and you know then had to erase it because she caught back up. So there's no real changes in the top five. Lacourte's still in yellow. We've got PFP and Kassia and Demi and Van der Breggen and they're all within 35 seconds of the leader. So you know, going into tomorrow, fireworks Only. Other updates here Nika Vika takes over the white jersey. No changes with Elise Shabby in the polka dots or Weebus in green. Weebus is starting to look pretty solid on that because there's not many sprints left.

Speaker 1:

No, no yeah, no, that's it. And I think, um, uh, to that point, the one thing I you mentioned shabby. I was like, oh my god, shabby's drifting back, and then you pointed out something that was really important and it plays into the tactics, kind of like the croupetto tactics. But uh, the commentators were saying, oh, shabby must be broken because she didn't go for it on the final hill. Climb, renee. What was she actually doing there tactically?

Speaker 2:

well she didn't have to go the. There were no points left for her to get right because there were still breakaway riders uh, up the front.

Speaker 1:

So basically, like there's only so many points and there's a ton of people up the road at that point, right, yeah, and and and. That's where I think for audience members watching to understand what's going on. Commentators you know they'll see shabby and they're like oh, she must be tired, she must be on this, but she's not. It's just like, tactically, now she can save for tomorrow. She doesn't have to burn it all on that climb.

Speaker 2:

Maybe a Squibbins in second in the polka dots.

Speaker 1:

now yeah, I believe that.

Speaker 2:

I mean she should be Shabby's 12 points ahead, so that's solid. But with the climbs that we have coming up in the next few days, I mean that'd be great. See Squibbin in Jersey. It was kind of fun today with all the riders. In the break we had Lucinda Brand and Chloe Digart, sharon Van Anroy, probably a few others that I can't think of, who are all multiple discipline riders. Uh, chloe is uh rides track and road. You know, last year at the olympics she wins a medal in both track and road in the same week. Or, you know, we can have the part um, you know, sharon van enroy, cycle cross store star. Lucinda brand, former world champion in cyclocross in a really key domestique on Little Trek. We've got some other names. I'm not going to name them all, but some big ones.

Speaker 1:

Puck Peterse, PFP.

Speaker 2:

Puck Peterse is the current mountain bike world champion. She was just like at some World Cups a couple of weeks ago and now is at the Tour de France. Pfp multiple discipline boss. You know there there's a lot of other names out there our french friend, uh, caroline manny uh, let me know about, uh, juliet labue and evita music. I'd uh forgotten about those.

Speaker 2:

My point is we see this a lot in the women's field, you know, doing multiple disciplines and doing it well. We see it a little bit on the men's side. You know Vanderpoel, van Aert, tom Pidcock between mountain biking and cyclocross and success on the road, I think there's fewer crossovers there, crossovers there. So I think there's some interesting dynamics about why the women might be more prevalent to do that. We'll talk about that in a little later. But I know that you coach a lot of like multiple discipline athletes, people who are racing cyclocross in the winter, road in the summer, or maybe even doing a dual summer season of mountain biking and road biking, and I thought that our listeners would really like to hear about that, because I know there's a lot of athletes out there trying to do that. So I wanted to get your input on what you thought some effective training strategies are for these athletes in. You know maybe what some of the biggest challenges are.

Speaker 1:

You know from the top level down another discipline that we could weave into it a little more too. So I think, first, high level, the reason why we see it a little bit more on the women's side of things is because field sizes and numbers of people are just less than the men's side, right the fields being kind of deeper, more competitive, both cross and road. So if you're just, if you're a good bike racer for the women and you have some decent ability that will carry over, it's a little bit easier to get into it a little bit more.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I think that's like I want to add another thing about why. You know we talked a lot about money this week in the Peloton. Women, you know, uh, not making as much as men. Well, in particular with cyclocross, I know that the top names, puck and Voss and people are making start money.

Speaker 2:

I asked our friend and coach, five-time French national cyclocross champion, caroline Manning, for a little intel on that today. She said that she was making like $1,000 start money and she wasn't like, she was very, very good, like podium on the world. You know how good she was Twice beat PFP to win her national championship, once beat Juliette LeBou, so fun fact. Anyway, my point is, you know she was making about $1,000. You know, I would guess that, like Voss, peterson, were making thousands. So anyway, it's like pocket money for an hour's worth of work. You know, I think the other reason a lot of these women started in cross and or mountain biking and then maybe went to the road, because the road is where you can make. The teams are bigger. You know that was something that caroline mentioned about, especially the two french riders I mentioned is that just more opportunity for them to be professional road riders. So that was um interesting and maybe another big reason that they're all racing cross.

Speaker 1:

It's a blast, it's a lot of fun yeah, well, I mean exactly, and that's kind of where I was going to get with. It is like from the developmental side of things, especially in Europe, cyclocross is culturally just a ton of fun. You can put a kid on a bike, have them start racing. You get a ton of opportunity. They're short races. You can race multiple times in the same weekend and it really develops skill and race tactics quite well. Then as you move up, the road develops everything and the road is where the money's at more or less. From that standpoint, with the season layup as it is, being able to do a road and cross season, especially on the women's side of things, it works out pretty well, making more money most of the women making more money on the road versus cross. But then the cross specific riders, yeah, they'll make pretty good money there as well. So that's kind of why those dual race seasons can work.

Speaker 1:

I think the mountain bike to road is is more tricky. Throw in cyclocross and like what puck's doing that, that's real tricky. Um PFP is kind of like expanded that over her whole career and season but or, sorry, her whole career and done so with um. You know really good success. But when it comes down to managing it, I mean. But when it comes down to managing it, I mean, yes, I coach riders like that, but it is. It is not straightforward, it's not a one-size-fits-all. I think the biggest thing is make sure to take your breaks. Oh well, look at that. Who's our special guest appearance today?

Speaker 2:

um a very uh fond, uh uh cat of mine. His name's sam Sammy. He likes the meowing stages.

Speaker 1:

The meowing stages. Well, I feel like Miss Allie Tetrick probably paid you to have that cameo happen, but where were we?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, just talking about managing different disciplines right.

Speaker 1:

You got to take your breaks in between seasons. I think for especially my junior elites that are doing that, there's very short time periods between, like, cyclocross worlds and then the start of some of the junior Nations Cup at the beginning of the year, the nation's cups or the like the big races, right, and then world championships. Then we got like a well, cycle cross actually starts a little bit before that and we have very short time period to go into cross. So I think it's the racing year round. You got to do a very good job of planning in breaks when you can, um, especially like kind of right now is a good time to take a break If you're a junior race in both road, both road and cross, and those breaks are crucial, meanwhile keeping it fun. You know, at every level of the sport, even at the elite level or the master's level, if you're racing a bunch of road races and then kind of carry that fitness over into cross, take your breaks, because you'll just burn out if you don't you'll just burn out if you don't.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I wanted to follow up on that because I was thinking about some of the athletes that I coach who are dual sport athletes. But you know, I live here in Colorado. I coach some people up in Aspen and Vail and Breckenridge who their two sports seasons are. I ski in the winter and I ride in the summer and you know some interesting things about you know balancing that. That you know they're, you know flipping switches a little bit on how they approach their disciplines and you know when it's a completely different sport and you know, maybe not as intense, you know the breaks don't have to be as much. Because they're coming off a ski season they're super psyched to ride their bike, or it's getting to October, it's too cold and veiled a ride. So you know, go into the gym, get strong and get ready for ski season. So you know that's. That's kind of the thing that I see a lot with my uh, a lot of athletes I coach.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, that's it, and I think too it's. It's again goes back to the like, uh, the individual level of things. And also, how much are you racing? Cause it's usually the travel, the races, all this kind of stuff. It kind of cracks you out a little bit more. And so I think if you stay ahead of your planning, if you're a self-coached athlete, of when you're going to take those breaks, kind of in the shoulder seasons of the year, you can look forward to that. You can see the light at the end of the tunnel and actually take a break, no matter, like, how good you're feeling.

Speaker 1:

I think the mental break is probably the most important because physically, in between seasons, most masters level riders I mean that the fatigue can be resolved in a couple of weeks. At the elite level changes a little bit, could be a little bit longer, but I think it's mentally. You need that time to decompress and take the pressure off for, like, performing or achieving those goals. Not everything needs to be, you know, optimized or you don't have to be, you know, on it all the time. You need to chill out a little bit, just ride your bike and have some easy days.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and you know, back to my point on the, you know, depending on how seriously you're taking it, obviously, if you're Puck Peterson, she really needs a break and she really needs to manage that. If you're just, you know, the weekend warrior and the summer bike rider and the winter skier, you know you're getting enough freshness and break between just the switching of the sport. So it's like completely different ends of the spectrum of course, but you know, I just thought I'd mention that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, it's definitely. I mean it's spot on and it's really good to mention. I think for the age groupers at least the athletes that I coach is like they think they need to be on all the time. So it's like when they flip the switch, it's like they go from like full on bike racing mode or like like full on bike mode and then there's like full on ski mountaineering or whatever it is, and it's just like whoa, whoa chill. You can like transition a little bit more easily. You don't have to be full tilt, full gas all in one sport versus the other yeah, it depends on how seriously you're taking it.

Speaker 2:

You know talk about training load and you know how much recovery you need off a training load if you're riding six hours a week, so maybe not needing as much of a break at the end of that yeah, well, let's, uh, let's look ahead to stage eight and let's start to bring this thing home here, renee um adam. Tomorrow is the day um your day no, it's the day of the race.

Speaker 2:

This is the queen stage of the Tour de France FEMS. It is the only mountaintop finish. The race tops out on the Col d'Op Madelaine, which is almost 20 kilometers. At 8%, this is going to take them more than an hour to climb. At 8%, this is going to take them more than an hour to climb. So we expect, you know, minutes, potentially in time gaps. That would be a real thing to happen.

Speaker 2:

The stage starts with a climb out of the gate 13 kilometer climb. Then it's kind of lumpy in the middle and then you hit the final climb at the end. Special alert Peacock is airing the race live in the US from start. So that's 740 Eastern. I think this is the one that you guys want to watch the whole stage, because this is it. It's a Saturday, it's the weekend. I say after your ride tomorrow, I want you to maximize your recovery, park yourself on the couch, grab some snacks and watch the race, because it's going to be fireworks for sure and I think we will have a very good idea of who's going to win the overall by the end of tomorrow?

Speaker 1:

Yep, yep, I would agree with that, and I was thinking you were thinking it'd be your day to take over GC on the fantasy Tour de France, fom of X, zwift from the CTS Fantasy League. You're kind of crushing it, adam. But who's your pick for tomorrow, renee?

Speaker 2:

I'm going to go.

Speaker 1:

I'm trying. I'm in yellow. I got to keep it for the next couple stages, but yeah, who's your pick for tomorrow?

Speaker 2:

I'm going to place my bets on Sarah Gigante. She's arguably the best climber in the race. She won the two mountain stages at the Giro by significant gaps, over like Rooser and in longer bikini. Now, that wasn't those gals, weren't Demi? But Gigante can win and Demi can still win the overall, or PFP can still win the overall, because Gigante is a little bit back. I should have to look at her time gap today to find out. And I was listening to the wheel talk podcast.

Speaker 2:

Um, if you guys want to nerd out totally on the race tactics and the inside baseball stuff on, uh, women's racing wheel talk is uh, it's a pretty good one. She had a writer diary yesterday and she said when the race uh route was announced last year, she marked her calendar for tomorrow's stage. She has been out uh this early spring. She and her mom did airbnb tour to recon every stage and she is uh on it. So, um, my, my outside pick. It's not really an outside, but it's uh, it's a shot. She is 114 back on on gc. That's it's not impossible. It's an outside shot, but it's not impossible to get up there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, they could let her go. A little bit of a leash I'd say it's an outside pick. I mean, if there's any stage that she could win, it's definitely this one. But I feel like, after seeing Squibin go up the road and I don't know, I think the likes of Damie, especially in PFP. I think we'll start to flex her muscles a little bit more. Cassio will be there, but I might go with the Queen Bee tomorrow. I might go with Damien.

Speaker 2:

That is not. It's a solid pick. We're going to have to see.

Speaker 1:

We shall see. We shall see. Well, renee, we shall see tomorrow, and I'm assuming that you're going to be watching the full stage in its entirety.

Speaker 2:

You betcha.

Speaker 1:

Stressing out at 540 mountain time.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Well, I look forward to that. I look forward to couch and snacks and watching some more bike racing. Renee, thank you again for the complete stage summary, all the insights and really taking the reins on this whole TDFF podcast that CTS is so graciously supporting us to do. So appreciate it.

Speaker 2:

All right, we'll see you tomorrow.

Speaker 1:

All righty and audience members, we will see you back here tomorrow post-stage. And don't forget to just share this with a friend. Like it on all the socials. Smash that like button on YouTube if you're watching it there. And, yeah, keep on helping us share this show because if you like it, you'll see it again next year. Maybe we do some other riffs and versions of it in the future to come. So thanks again for all of our listeners. Renee, ciao, Ciao.

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Adam Pulford

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