Monday's typically a rest day. So, Sunday evening, you've just ridden long Saturday, four or five hours. You've ridden long Sunday, four or five hours. Saturday evening actually requires a bit of restriction because Sunday evening, sorry, Sunday evening requires a bit of restriction because you're stopping looking at your diet in like 24-hour cycles. You're looking at, okay, well, what's coming ahead tomorrow? And there's nothing coming ahead tomorrow. So, you don't really need to fuel very much for nothing coming ahead tomorrow. Yeah, I think the club guys are quite likely to go out and bang a 16inch pizza and go, I kind of earned it over the weekend. Yeah. And they don't Yeah. it's not going to do any harm. But if we're talking about absolute performance, um because if yeah, if they've done five or six hours and you're looking at, you know, five or six thousand calorie like day, then that's still an awful that's hard. That's hard to get to. Um but yeah, I mean my I had a year of that where I used my fitness pal to track and I was taking everything on a on a 24-hour like when I woke up to when I go to sleep and I what we found And with tracking my weight as well, generally training was a three-day block, one day rest. And my weight would go, you drop, I don't know, point three or point four of a kilo every day of the three-day block. And then on the rest day, you'd gain I'd gain a kilo. I knew if on the rest day that I had maintained the weight of the 3-day block, um, I was in trouble for the next training day. I I I had to have gained something because it's replenishing glycos glycogen stores. It's it's water um retention. Um so what was what I was doing was it was taking everything I was I was doing exactly that. I'd have like Sunday for example Sunday would be like a big 5h hour day. Um, and if Monday is a rest day, like Sunday, I would be trying to get my fitness power up to a like minus like 500 calorie deficit minimum. Maximum minimum like no more. Yeah. Um, so I'd be doing all my eating after the ride and and then I' be like, right, Monday, that's an 1,800 calorie day, so it' be mostly protein and fat. and then I'd just be flat as a pancake on Tuesday in terms of training because I haven't replenished any glycogen stores. Now, what um I kind I spoke to a nutritionist in Oregon who um kind of just changed my thinking. Is isn't this what all the pros are doing now? And it's that to start thinking just always three meals ahead of training. And there's possibly an easier way of doing it than a um a 24-hour cycle. I I don't I haven't used this the Hexus app or the I think Jumbo Visma have one as well. The free athletes kitchen or something or something like that. Something like that. Yeah. Um I used to just think three meals ahead. So if I'm training like say Mon say Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Saturday's a big day, Sunday's big day, Monday's a rest day. Like Saturday doing my training ride. We're going to have high carb I have my recovery drink. Um high carb lunch, high carb dinner, high carb breakfast, big training day Sunday, recovery drink, and then you're on the low carb. Um that then it kind of you said your day finishes at your recovery drink and then your next day starts at your meal after your recovery drink after training. So it actually becomes quite intuitive when you think about it. The way you explained it there, you're thinking that two, three meals ahead cycle. Yeah. But where I struggle with it a little bit is for somebody, the club rider who's trying to cut weight, someone who's trying to lose five, six kilograms, it can feel quite counterintuitive to be tucking into bigger feeds than normal while trying to lose weight. Yeah. I mean, I guess there's um uh you if you're fueled right cuz I mean like people love to eat. People love food. It's a like it's a big topic of conversation for probably 80 90% of the population in economically developed countries is trying to eat less so they can lose weight. But a love of food. Yeah. Um if you are well fueled, you will be able to exercise harder. You you will burn more. So you kind of enable you you will enable more food if that makes sense. And then but then when it's time to restrict you really restrict. And I think that's it's just more polarized isn't it? It's like when it's time to eat you bloody well eat. And when it's time to restrict you you can restrict without fear. Do you think those GLP1 antagonists, your ompic are going to creep into cycling or are we past that era of temptation for that stuff around food? I think I' I'd like to think we're past that. I don't I don't see the I think the knowledge is so the not the knowledge of how to do it whilst training efficiently is is so good that if riders I don't know if riders are needing to do that then don't know if pro cycling is the place for them if good for Yanick though Yanick could have won six seven tours with us just just to add to the like the cabinet of whatever it was going on. Yeah. Untested how empaic could go into the mix. Yeah. Yeah. He still looked great though. He did. Yeah. Oh, that's it only gets in shape. Those pictures at 98 tour him and Pantani climbing. Pantani's in the Uno X kit. They're just like iconic images of Olrich. They don't make humans like that anymore. No. No. It's um Yeah, that was that was an era, wasn't it?
Peak masculinity. So you do have you're as you're self-confessed not an expert on nutrition. You are an expert on aerodynamics and you are in a standard this year. How did that how did that transition happen from could we call you internet influencer pro cyclist gravel racer internet influencer? I yeah internet influencer. Yeah, I guess so. I guess on the surface of it was just um I had a phone call. I had a No, I had a WhatsApp from Cavendish uh six weeks out from a tour to France. Just a casual, hey mate, do you know anything about tire aerodynamics? And um I called him. I said, I I'm said, your message concerns me. I like Yes. Yes, I do. I is in do I know anything? I know what's fast and I know what isn't fast through a massive amount of testing. Um, so I do, but I'm like three things concern me. One, it's six weeks out to the tour to France and you're thinking about this. Two, this hasn't been done in the winter. And three, you're calling me like from Do you have mates? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But like, you know, I have nothing to do with his racing. of nothing to do with Estana at this time. And I was like, shouldn't there be, it's like, shouldn't there be someone who has done this quite a long time ago? Um, and then C was like, yeah, yeah, but you you know how it is in like an awful lot of World Tour teams. Um, you kind of have to do this stuff yourself. So I kind I said, um, okay, well, what's I said, yes, I can and help. What else is going on? What else is missing? um and just asked a few questions, found a few holes, and he was like, "I'm off to a wind tunnel next week." And it was interestingly only the second time he'd ever been in a wind tunnel in his whole career, which I found Yeah, I found surprising. Um, and so went along, found some um found some holes uh that we could fill um just to get some sort of um get some advantages for him. Things like the arrow bottles really worked on the Willia. Um what sort of savings is an arrow bottle? That was about 2 and a half% uh saving on CDA. Okay. Um that's pretty big. Yeah. Yeah. Um, you just looked at it and you just kind of like, well, it looks like it's going to work and oh, it works. Um, is the consideration for cal when you're talking about or maybe the answer is both. Is the consideration CDA at 75k an hour? We had Yeah, we were doing speed or cruise speed. Uh, we're doing high speed, low y. Um, so yes, it was it was it wasn't 75. I think we were at 60 or 65. Um, so yeah, and then we played a bit with helmets. I actually put a it was quite entertaining. Put a um we took a number of helmets with us. Some work, some didn't. Uh the yeah the Trex TX ballista helmet worked very well on him, but the gyro arrow head that Jumbo Visma are now using in um in racing worked the best. And I was like that's a you decision. That's a you decision of you. Mark Cavendish is going to take an arrow helmet into a into a road race. There's your legacy guard. Yeah. Yeah. But I think in the end Lamar um took note of the flaws and added a they added like a a little fin thing to the back of the back of their helmet which you've seen our Estana riders at the moment. It's a gold it's it's gold. Um so yeah, we found that was another two and a half% that that gyro arrow head. Um considering how close that stage win was or any sprint stage win normally is. Yeah, he he chucked everything and the kitchen sink at it. Um, and it was So, yeah, back to your original question, helped a lot, and then uh Cab said to the team, you should employ him, and the team employed me. So, you he initially text you about tires. I remember chatting to Matt Bottl about this, and you know, I'm so out of the loop on this stuff. Bot was telling me it's actually more about the tire, wheel, bike system now as a whole rather than one in isolation. We can't just say they are the fastest tires full stop. It ends up being different based on those other variables. Was that your experience with it? Well, we we it's funny in the end I think we didn't after all that we didn't really look at tires. Um we because there was there was larger gains to find elsewhere we felt. Um but Matt's Matt's bang on. Um, and tires is something I think is there's Yeah, there's there's been no Matt Matt is very right. Tire type, tire size, rim width, internal rim width. It's a bit of a minefield. So, you can't you kind of have to make it specific for your setup. Um, and then ride like rider preference, race environment. um all front and back as well all comes into the equation. Um but that's quite interesting as a consumer because you know if you go on to wherever you buy your tires Sigma Sports or whatever like there's no data about this. There's no like this tire will work best with this wheel for this type of rider on this bike. You're just really presented with the tire options and then you come home with the tires, then you listen to a podcast like this and you're like, "Oh, boss." Yeah. Yeah. It's I I think the reason for that is I don't I think tires is the next frontier um for quite big steps forward. I I found some stuff this winter.
There's only one rider that really made the pushup position work and that was Tony Martin. Um, but he was the panzer. Yeah. But he he was a a lauren to himself, an enigma, an anomaly. There we go. Tony was an anomaly in the time trial world. Um, so yeah, but developing something. Yeah, I I positionally I think uh a refined time trial specific retool could could get there. And is this a problem on a smaller scale you're trying to solve with a Stanner? Because obviously you alluded to working one-on-one with Cavendish with the size of a world tour squad now. Do you have time to work one-on-one with every rider? We work. Yes. Yes, we do. Um some big winter training camps to rattle through um we did. Yeah, we we managed to arrow test on the track 60% of the team. Um, and it's it's actually my first time doing track testing from the other side of the fence, especially with non-track riders. I've done track arrow testing, but cuz they can't hold a black line. Yeah. One I mean, one rider, I won't name names, one rider like almost crashed. Name them. No. Um, and he was just like, I've never ridden the track. I don't know how to ride the track. And and actually, I don't want to do this. I was like, "Okay, it's fine. I don't want to be responsible for a collarbone break under my watch anyway." So, um, and actually, we're going to get nothing from this because you're going to be terrified of just riding the track over getting like positionally dialed in. You could see there was one there's one rider uh Romel um who was a track rider and it's like you're looking at his numbers like Jesus Christ like he's just clocking same every like CDA is is not moving around at all. It's just remarkable. I'm like what's going on here? It's like oh he's a pursuit. So then a kind of the track testing um I I don't I think it's good because I think riders are under the same stresses they're under when they're well or not exactly the same because it's you know eight laps versus 18k or whatever but it gives they're having to put power down. I think the downside to it is fatigue um and an unfamiliarity of the track and a lack of your angles as well, but there's something to be said for it. Um yeah, I I think my preference would still be heading to the win tunnel there. Yeah, but it starts it's like paralle principle, isn't it? It starts to get them 80% of the way there for 20% of the effort you're knocking off some of the really big gains. Yeah. And I think with a starter, you know, you look at our roster, we have we do not have um I hope and I hope no one would mind, we do not have a specialist. Aaron Gate would be the closest to our time trial specialist. Um but even for and and Mike Toyerson and Fedorov are time trialists, but we like we do not have a um who can Gan is the obvious one like say even a Mikl. Yeah. Um, so we have GC riders who have to be good at time traveling. Um, and that's so, so it's kind of the efforts is where do you focus your efforts? And the time trial has been, um, we've made enough of an effort, let's say, on In some ways, does not having the star make it easier to assemble a TTT team? Yeah. Yeah. Um, no. I think it's I think a TTT. Uh, poor I've danced around that answer, haven't I? Um, I don't think it makes a difference. I think having a star just gives you someone to to lean on. Um, but ultimately, I think having a a team having a team that is a team is the important thing for a team time travel. Yeah. I having trying to remove because we had the Paranese team time trial recently and um the one thing and I went out I I I don't know I kind of I'd say I dsed for the day um and the one thing I say is like when I was at Bobby Star alarmingly good at team time triing for very much a lack of work in the team time trial. Um, and I said for me it put that down to like a fundamental lack of ego within the team. Like everyone just left their ego on the bus, went and did like what they could do and not a single second more. And I put that down to two things. One is like the Spanish the whole mentality within Maui Star was was brilliant um and really conducive to um an ego-free team time trial. And the second thing is that almost the like obviously there was no pacing strategies, no power predictions, no um how long you spend on the front. It was even like when it came down to order, there wasn't much consideration for order either. So, and I I'm not saying that was the best way of doing it. I was saying there's something in it just that like you get off the front before you start slowing the train down. Yeah. Like that's that's pretty much a smart group of riders to pull that off though. Yes. Yeah. And they were they knew their ability and they were and we had a smart group of riders in par. So um I think a couple of leaders what happens with the team time trial as well interestingly is the riders take control of it. Like the more you do like we did the more training you do the more the riders start talking. It's like, well, we need to do this, we need to do that. And the riders take ownership of the race cuz they've suddenly they've ridden the course.
We didn't need to go to burnt orange, burnt orange and fluuro orange. But you you still by the time the race came around, it's like you knew who was who exactly. it didn't really matter. Um, so from the team car behind, we had uh one rider like missed a turn and it was like I was on the radio and it was so easy for me to then go, okay, like this rider is sitting on um case you're now looking for um Tahada's wheel. Tahard is in burnt orange. Yeah. Um and that made that a lot easier rather than just trying to work out quickly who's that whose wheel is he on like quickly now. It just it made those decisions faster as well. Um because that can be super messy in the heat of battle. It sounds obvious for someone listening, but if you're a two beats below max heart rate trying to figure out whose wheel you're now on with one person sitting on, did he just skip one turn or is he sitting on totally and it's like to have that conciseness and clarity of communication is really important. Yes. And that that worked for that. Um so yeah, it worked. I mean, yeah, we got 13th, which I think there was, I said in my Instagram post, internally that was a positive result. Um, so everyone was happy. It kept our GC boys in the GC battle. Um, so it was Yeah, it was it was it was positive and and a bit that I didn't get afterwards, like the the buzz about the gloves and the overshoes. It was the team were like, "God, we're getting so much press from this." It's like this there's two teams being talked about with the team time trial jumbo visma because they won it and ask. Uh before we finish up, I asked uh our some of our email list uh some questions to ask you because you were coming on and did some not really odd ones, but standard enough ones. But interesting to get your take on it. What's the worst cycling purchase you ever made? Hey everybody, let's take a quick break to talk about the bike I'll be riding this season, Reap. I've been lucky enough to ride all the top brands in the world over the past few years. But these Reap bikes, they're not the same. And I'll tell you why. Reap is the first company I've seen that isn't chasing sales targets and the mass market. They're chasing something very rare. Perfection. Every bike they make, it's crafted in the UK factory. And it's not about slapping a Made in Britain label on a bike from a Chinese factory. It's about control. From the first sketch to the final build, they're hands-on, ensuring that every detail is dialed in. That's very rare in an outsourced world of mass production. What sets them apart is innovation. While others pump out the same old designs, reaps pushing boundaries. They're not following trends, they're setting trends. Think precision and performance like an F1 car for the road. Absolutely no compromises. And it shows and you can feel it when you ride the bikes. These bikes are built for riders who demand the best. Whether they're chasing podiums or just want a machine that feels like an extension of your body, a piece of art. It's not hype, it's substance. Ride a reap for yourself. And you're riding something crafted with intent. So, if you're serious about cycling, check them out. It's reapikes.com. I absolutely love my one and I couldn't recommend it highly enough. Back to the show. Worst cycling purchase. Uh, so pretty. I've got a BT track bike now, but when I was a kid, I bought a set of BT um I know I sent them back off Stuart Dangerfield BT handlebars that I really wanted to work on my time trial bike, but they didn't. They made my position a lot higher, but they were just they were a thing of beauty. Um so, not those. Um, I'm going to throw mine out there when you were thinking compact group just doesn't work. Um, I promise like one of those things you you know is I guess it's based on what you know now. Um, say maybe maybe ketones before I understood them. Yeah, they work for almost no one. I've had physiologists on the podcast talking about how basically there's nobody should be using those. There's never been good peer-reviewed data on them at all. And we, again, I fell into that trap as well. We had them as early sponsor on the podcast. I was like, maybe they're doing something, but like it's just you've never there's no good data on it. It's like how do you know? or it just becomes placebo. Yeah, probably that. Um, I'd say I never actually I'm I'm custom handlebars. I'm I am so on the fence with custom handlebars. Um, because for two reasons. I think the aftermarket options now are so bloody good. Yeah. and just the the limiter on custom handlebars for any positional changes, positional development. Um, I did buy a set of custom handlebars in my career, but they were custom for Matias Brandley. Um, it was on the factor Hanzo and I can get them. I'll show you. I'll show you. Yeah, these the factor was not a simple I don't know like Oh, they're beautiful. The Factor wasn't a simple um bike to put handlebars on in its infancy. And yeah, Matias Branley had had these made and he said he's like, "Oh, the the guy that makes them, he'll make them he'll make a set for you as well." And I got sent a set of instruction or a set like a a um a list of like dimensions and everything that I'd want my hands in. And I was like, I don't know. Like without going and spending three or four hours in a win tunnel like I don't know.
And I put my arms in brands. I was like, "These are nice. Make me them." Yeah. And that's And yeah. So I mean custom custom handlebars I if you are if you have spent 10 to 15 hours testing and you like have have made a position work then and only then get the custom handlebars. But even then, make sure that they're like symmetric, like symmetrical. I know you're killing me here cuz I have my TT bike. I've It's Ben O Conor's old TT bike. So, I have his 3D printed arrow bars on it. And my mate who's aerodynamicist with Fusion, he's just like like there's almost no chance they're going to work for you. There's no no adaptability whatsoever in them. They look so cool. And it's like, I really want to make these work, but I can hardly like I can hardly get into the position on them. Yeah, I mean it just the options are so good now. Like Aerero Coach has every kind of hand position you can want. The I've been so impressed with the Vision option we have with Aana. Um Vision make great kit. Yeah, like the adjustability of them and the comfort. I mean, I think they're based on Wan Arts custom handlebars and like unsurprisingly they're comfortable because they're Wan Arts custom handlebars. And that's you get on a time trialist's bike with the exception of the anomaly that is Tony Martin, you find that it's it's it's much comfier than you're expecting it to be. Like I thought my TT bike was comfortable after the National 25 in 2020. I got on Dan Bigham's TT bike. I was like, "Bloody hell, this is more comfortable." Um, what's the XLAB bikes like? They're fine. They're good. Cuz there's a lot of I I don't know many of the Astana lads personally, but I know some of the the Catlan lads pretty well. And I know when they heard they were getting van rises, they was like, "Oh, come on. Are you kidding me?" And then they were actually quite happy with the bike in the end. I'm sure it was a similar sentiment when it people heard we're going from Willier to XLab. The riders were Yeah, I thought I was more worried about the rider um perception than I needed to be. The riders were far more open-minded about it than I really thought they were going to be. Um, and hats off to them for that. The um the road bike is is very good. Um, the TT bike we've I think as a starting point, we've been very lucky with how good it is. Um, and one of my first jobs within the team was to stick everything in a tunnel and test everything and make sure that it stacks up. The TT bike was quicker with and without a rider than the Willers bike, not the Willia that Kung's riding or that now Fjure are riding. Um, which Estana I don't think Estana ever had the option to have because it was a joint venture between Four and Okay. Willia, but it was it's quicker than Willia's um previous time travel bike quite significantly actually. And uh yeah, and the road bike was um I didn't test it against a Willia. Um the road bike was was in the like the the very correct ballpark as well. So that's good. Um and it's it's interest. It's like it's a this is a line I've been wanting to use for a while. Um like with the teams because obviously the team's doing it like very well this year. Um and there's been we've made quite a few changes. Obviously the bikes, tires as well. um that which was a me thing. Um when the and I'd say everyone has moved up like 30 or 40 positions in racing just where they finish in the race. Everyone's moved up and and it's kind of like when there's a step change difference in the way everyone's performing or when all the riders performing. It's actually not about the riders, it's about everything else. riders probably won't be too happy about me saying that, but it's the, you know, I wasn't in the team last year. Um, but I know from PE riders that were saying there has been a step change difference in the team this year and like the results are showing for it. You know, we're we're second in the team rankings at the moment, which given the relegation battle that the team's got on is exactly where we need to be and exactly what we need to be doing. So, it's um yeah, it's pretty cool. Two or more rapid fire ones before we finish up. Favorite cycling holiday destination. Um probably Lanerati. Lanzerati in the winter. Very windy in Lanzerati. Yeah, I like I just I like that. But in the winter especially, I I never quite understood. I understand why teams go to Calpe because of um like you can drive everything there and the Canary Islands, you'd have to fly everything there. But for solo winter training, I've never understood the fascination with Calpe and Morca in the winter when you can go an hour and a half longer on a plane and have guaranteed shorts in New Jersey weather. Yeah, it's a good point. Uh, and the last one, the now that you're back mixing it with regular Joe's and Janes and the group spins and club rides and local tens. What's the biggest mistake you've seen amateurs making? Um, it's rapid fire question. It's not a rapid fire answer, is it? My one's probably uh was on a group ride. Terrifying. uh not with my group and I seen a lad descender with the wrong crank down going around corners. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's that's good one. Nearly set me on fire. Sparking through the corners. Wow. Um I can't Yeah. I hate train it. Try training efficiently. Um just too much going riding with the lads.