All roads lead to Florence
Meet The Cycling Podcast's 2024 Tour de France team
by Lionel Birnie
If you listened to this week’s episode, All Roads Lead To Florence, you’ll have heard Daniel hand over the mic as he headed to the Critérium du Dauphiné to start his summer-long loan spell at ITV.
Our 2024 Tour de France team made their first appearance together to kick-off the final countdown to the Grand Départ in Italy. We’d like to extend a very warm welcome to broadcaster and journalist Graham Willgoss, who will be joining Mitch Docker and Richard Abraham to cover the race from Florence to Nice via the Alps, Pyrenees and all points in between.
I’m very excited about the new-look line-up and, by giving Graham, Richard and Mitch the opportunity to record together as Tour fever mounts over the coming weeks, they will sound like old friends by the time they sit down outside a cafe in Rimini with a beer (or ice cream) to recap stage one on Saturday, June 29.
As long-time listeners will know, Daniel became Television’s Daniel Friebe in 2016 when he was recruited by ITV for their Tour de France coverage. I remember Richard Moore and I had a conversation about what to do. We were about to cover our fourth Tour as The Cycling Podcast and felt we had got into a groove. While delighted for Daniel, it left us with a conundrum.
‘What will we do?’ I said, trying to conceal the panic in my voice. (I’ve got marginally better with the concept of change since).
‘We’ll just go the two of us,’ said Richard.
‘What,’ I said, ‘just the two of us?’
‘Yeah, it’ll be fine,’ he replied with typical confidence in our collective abilities.
That 2016 Tour started in Normandy and finished at Utah Beach with a Mark Cavendish stage win, giving him the first (and so far only) maillot jaune of his career. That stage came to mind yesterday as the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings was commemorated in France.
Over the course of the three weeks, Daniel dropped in once or twice a week and we were joined by a rolling cast of guests including Caley Fretz, François Thomazeau, Andy Hood, Dan Hakkenberg, Seb Piquet, David Millar and Ciro Scognamiglio. As brilliant as they all were at adding a different perspective to our coverage each day, we realised that we needed a permanent third host. That is where François came in, joining us for the 2017 Grand Départ in Düsseldorf and staying in his nest as a key part of our Tour coverage until we dropped him off at Le Viscos last year.
So it’s great to be able to confirm a settled Tour de France line-up almost a month before the Grand Départ.
Graham joins us for the first time but is no stranger to holding the mic. Many cycling fans will remember him as host of Eurosport’s Bradley Wiggins Show podcast. In 2021, Graham covered the Tour de France with Wiggins. I’m tempted to say that if he can cope with that he can cope with anything and that the Tour with The Cycling Podcast will be a doddle, but I don’t like to tempt fate because you never know what will happen on the road. He’s also got a strong background in written media as chief sub-editor of the excellent and much-missed Sport magazine, a sub-editor at The Sunday Times and a writer for Rouleur and Cyclist magazines.
Richard Abraham has been a regular voice on the podcast this season having joined me for the final week of the Tour de France coverage last year and impressed with his journalistic eye for a story with a different angle. And, of course, Mitch Docker needs no introduction having joined us for part of each Tour de France since 2021. He’s just published his book too. Life in the Peloton is available exclusively from our clothing partners MAAP.
We will give a fuller introduction to the Tour team over the coming editions of The 11.01 Cappuccino and, of course, they will be back on the airwaves next week to recap the Critérium du Dauphiné.
Then, after the Olympic Games, it’ll be over to Rose Manley and Denny Gray in August for coverage of the Tour de France Femmes, which starts in Rotterdam and finishes at Alpe d’Huez.
Join us for a ride in Richard’s memory
Richard Moore’s dad Brian, and Richard’s two brothers Robin and Peter, would like our listeners – and especially Friends of The Cycling Podcast – to join them at West Lothian cycle circuit in Linlithgow, Scotland, on Saturday, July 20, when Mark Beaumont will unveil a plaque in Richard’s memory.
The plaque was designed and created in clay by Stacy Snyder so that it could be cast in bronze. The finished plaque has made its way to Scotland from the United States and it will be placed in the corner of ‘Buffalo Bend’, which is at one end of the circuit near to the entry gates.
Endurance cyclist Mark Beaumont, who holds the record for cycling around the world, will unveil the plaque before there’ll be a chance for everyone who brings a bike to ride on the circuit. There’ll be some riding, lighthearted racing, and coaching with Matt Ball, one of the driving forces behind the creation of the circuit at Linlithgow.
When it was still no more than drawings on a sheet of paper, the circuit was one of the first recipients of funds from the sale of Stacy Snyder’s grand tour cups. We asked for people to nominate worthy causes to support and the West Lothian Cycle Circuit’s case stood out. Richard championed the cause, not least because he loved the fact it would give young cyclists in Scotland an outdoor cycling facility that was not available to riders of his generation. Situated between Edinburgh and Glasgow, the circuit has a huge catchment area and can benefit a large number of riders from across the country.
In 2021, when I was planning the Tour d’Écosse ride I asked Matt if he would consider ‘unofficially’ naming one of the corners after Richard. Buffalo Bend was the name we came up with and next month the tribute will be made official.
Now there will be a permanent reminder of Richard’s contribution to the sport, not just as co-founder and host of The Cycling Podcast and the author of a number of excellent books, but as a rider who represented his country at the 1998 Commonwealth Games. He was also a big supporter of young riders and I know he would be delighted at the thought that the next generation of Scottish cyclists will be able to learn their craft at Linlithgow, whizzing round Buffalo Bend, before heading off to Europe and beyond to make their mark.
There is no limit on numbers so everyone who knew and loved Richard – including all our listeners – are very welcome. Bring your bike, bring a Cycling Podcast jersey or casquette of any vintage if you have one, and ride a few laps in Richard’s memory. And if you can’t bring a bike but just want to say hello and have a cup of tea, refreshments will be available. Brian has even promised the sun will be shining!
Saturday, July 20
West Lothian Cycle Circuit
McGinley Way, Linlithgow EH49 6SQ
Circuit open: 10.00 to 13.00
The plaque will be unveiled at a time to be confirmed between 10.00 and 13.00
KM0 – The very first episode
To kick-off our countdown to our 2024 Tour de France coverage let’s go back nine years to 2015 and the first episode of KM0.
KM0 was created partly because we were finding that a lot of the material we gathered on the ground at the Tour was not finding its way into the episodes. A spin-off show, released on weekday mornings, would give us an opportunity to tell a different type of story from the Tour. As we were all writers, the format meant we could create magazine feature-style pieces in audio.
The first episode was a gentle introduction to the format. We recorded ourselves arriving in Utrecht for the Grand Départ and getting reacquainted with the Tour de France circus. The opening scene brings back fond memories of the dynamic between the three of us at the time. Richard at the wheel with his foot on the accelerator, me in the passenger seat trying – and often failing – to get us where we needed to go, and Daniel in the back, seemingly in a world of his own but actually cooking up some kind of genius to drop in at a later date.
The entire KM0 back catalogue from the Tour de France is available one way or other. Episodes released from 2015 to 2019 are on a separate subscriber feed available exclusively to Friends of the Podcast. Episodes from 2020 to 2022 are mostly on the free-to-air feed and last year’s episodes are on the Friends of the Podcast feed. I am in the process of amalgamating the feeds so all our archive episodes are available in one place.
The Cycling Podcast is supported by MAAP
A big thank you to MAAP for supporting The Cycling Podcast. Check out the full range of clothing to make you look the part on, and off, the bike at maap.cc
Loving these 11.01s. I'm not going to lie, I was a little nervous about how TCP would handle le Tour.
I figured Mitch would be on it (huge fan of his LiTP work), and was hoping Richard would be as well (who is also a cracking writer).
But the 3rd cog? Hmmm. Then I see Graham Willgoss named on latest episode, and I'm thinking, who?? (Again, please no offence).
After listening to Daniel hand over the baton to Graham this week, my fears have subsided. I thought the trio worked really well together, considering it was their debut.
Really looking forward to see how they Tour is covered. 🙂