KM0: The Tour de France greatest hits II
Part two of Lionel's favourite episodes from the KM0 archive
by Lionel Birnie
Our build-up to the Tour de France continues with the second part of my list of favourite KM0 episodes made at the Tour de France. You can read part one here.
Most of these episodes are available exclusively to Friends of the Podcast. Sign up for a year’s subscription here and support The Cycling Podcast in the process. We are very grateful to all our listeners who choose to subscribe because it enables us to keep our regular grand tour and weekly episodes free for all.
Stage 11. Eddy The GOAT (2019)
With the 2019 Tour starting in Brussels and passing through Woluwe-Saint-Pierre, the suburb the Merckx family called home, we focused on the greatest rider of all-time. Five Tour wins, rainbow jerseys, the Hour Record, pretty much every stage race and Classic… How do you sum up Eddy Merckx’s career in 23 minutes? Well, with the help of Daniel Friebe, who wrote the excellent biography, The Cannibal, of course.
Stage 12. Super Mario (2019)
The 2019 race marked the 100th anniversary of the maillot jaune and I used the anniversary as the opportunity to delve into the story of the most distinctive leaders’ jerseys in Tour history. In 1989, the Tour had five classification leader’s jerseys – yellow, green and polka-dot, of course – but also a red jersey for the intermediate sprints competition, and the wonderful combined jersey (above) that rewarded consistency in each of the other competitions. A sort of best all-rounder prize, if you will. It was also the year an Italian company, Castelli, replaced the French sportswear brand Le Coq Sportif as supplier of the jerseys. Sacre Bleu, or perhaps that should be Sacre Jaune. Because they’d spent a small fortune on the rights, Castelli hired the pop artist Mario Schifano to come up with five very distinctive designs. Schifano was an Italian Andy Warhol-type figure and his illustrations divided opinion although they also make the 1989 jerseys instantly recognisable because there’s no others like them. I spent a small fortune on eBay tracking down some replica jerseys – the red jersey was the rarest and most expensive – then pieced together the story of Schifano and his designs.
Stage 13. 1999 (2019)
Anniversaries was a recurring theme of our 2019 KM0 series. It was 20 years since the first of Lance Armstrong’s now asterisked seven Tour titles. The 1999 Tour was also the first one I covered as a journalist. My strongest memories of that Tour are missing a Lance Armstrong press conference because I stood outside a closed door politely waiting to be invited in, not realising it was all going on inside the room, and my first encounter with David Walsh, a journalist whose work I’d read right from the days when I was first getting interested in cycling. ‘Who do you think will win?’ I asked him, as green as the grass. ‘I’m less interested in who wins but how he wins,’ was Walsh’s reply, loaded with subtext. For this two-part retrospective, I spoke to Walsh about that 1999 Tour and why there were doubts about Armstrong from the very start.
Stage 14. Eight Seconds (2019)
The closest Tour of all-time, when Greg LeMond turned the tables on Laurent Fignon in the final time trial, as recalled by LeMond and his wife Kathy, and François Thomazeau, who was there. This two-parter offers a fresh perspective on a race many consider the best ever – although there’s plenty of healthy debate about that point.
Stage 15. Col d’Èze (2020)
The 2020 Tour started in late August just as Europe was starting to emerge from a five-month lockdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic. It was quite surreal being in Nice that weekend. There was still a lot of caution but everyday life was returning to normal and people were mingling in crowds again. I went to ride the famous Col d’Èze, which will feature in the final time trial of this year’s race.
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Stage 16. Running Up That Hill (2021)
Bastille Day 2016 was one of the most remarkable days in modern Tour history. High winds meant the stage on Mont Ventoux had to be shortened, with the finish moved down the mountain to Chalet-Reynard. As a result the crowd was condensed and the road narrowed for the riders. This was the day Chris Froome lost his bike and ended up running up the road. With the benefit of hindsight, we tried to make sense of the chaos.
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Stage 17. Don’t Mention The Record (2021)
This episode was Richard Moore’s idea. ‘Why don’t you write about your experiences covering Mark Cavendish’s career and then record them?’ he said, the morning after Cavendish had equalled Eddy Merckx’s record of 34 Tour stages by winning in Carcassonne. There was still Paris to go and a chance for Number 35. Cavendish was third behind Wout Van Aert and Jasper Philipsen in Paris, he missed the Tour in 2022 when Quick Step decided not to select him, and last year he came close at Bayonne (sixth), closer on the motor racing circuit at Nogaro (fifth) and was a slipped gear away from beating Philipsen in Bordeaux before crashing out the following day. The outright record – Cavendish rightly points out that a joint-record is still a record – could be within his grasp this time but, having postponed retirement for one more crack at it, the clock is counting down. This is my account of the ups and downs covering Cavendish during his rise and reign as the greatest sprinter of all-time.
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Stage 18. 1984 (2022)
To mark the first edition of the Tour de France Femmes, we looked back at the first Tour Féminin, held in 1984. The race was won by the American rider Marianne Martin and in this episode she talks about her experience and the attitudes to women racers at the time. It’s eye-opening, inspiring and uplifting.
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Stage 19. François Thomazeau’s Tour Tales (2023)
What better way to get in the Tour de France mood than spend a couple of hours listening to François Thomazeau’s memories of almost 40 years covering the great race? This five-part series begins in 1986 with his first day as a journalist on the Tour and an abrupt encounter with Bernard Hinault. François is a fabulous story-teller and his memories show how the Tour has evolved, in many ways for the better, over the decades.
Stage 20: An Hour In Bordeaux (2023)
The Tour’s visit to Bordeaux meant we could look back three decades to one of the most astonishing summers in British cycling history, when Chris Boardman and Graeme Obree played tug-of-war with the Hour Record. Boardman’s camp chose the velodrome in Bordeaux on the morning the Tour stage was due to arrive in the city, calculating that they’d be able to persuade the world’s cycling press to take notice. Obree upstaged Boardman by breaking Francesco Moser’s record in Hamar, Norway, six days earlier. Boardman did exceed Obree’s distance and he was invited to appear alongside Tour de France leader Miguel Indurain on the podium. Little did he know then that less than 12 months later he’d be standing on the Tour podium in his own right, wearing the maillot jaune after winning the prologue of the 1994 Tour in Lille.
Stage 21: Le Journal Du Tour & Écrivain (2023)
A split stage to finish with, just like the Tour de France in the old days. This is a pair of episodes I really enjoyed making last summer. In the first, François and I talked about the history and legacy of the French daily sports paper L’Équipe and its relationship with the race. We recorded this sitting on a bench overlooking the sea in San Sebastian and I was aware that François would be fleeing his nest in the back of The Cycling Podcar a few days later, which gave the episode an extra layer of poignancy for me.
The second episode features Alex Roos, L’Équipe’s chief cycling correspondent, whose writing is lyrical and his interpretation of the sport is in the romantic traditions of Goddet, Blondin, Bouvet and Brunel.
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, created by Stacy Snyder, in Richard’s memory.
Bring a bike and join us on a few laps of the circuit, wear your Cycling Podcast jersey or casquette, if you have one. 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 11.00.
The Cycling Podcast is supported by MAAP
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