Daniel Friebe

Because we need another Swift at the Tour de France 🔊

@smplsailor Too tense. I can’t take another one.

@friebos WHAT DO U MEANNN?? HE MAKES THE RACE AS ELECTRIC AS IT GETS 😭

Right, Tadej. Never do that race again.

@colinfriden Not me, Colin - I’ve never been there. But this is it: share.google/I1XuLIyzEriDRC…

@friebos Hello Daniel, In France and can’t remember the restaurant you love with Francois. Believe it’s in Pyrenees. Can you help?

@NoMapNoCompass @the_ripoman @ITV You and me both!

@friebos @the_ripoman @ITV My dream is that ITV cycling coverage returns to our screens and we have a Gary Imlach cutting to a stage highlights montage that has Paul Seixas dropping Pogacar on Alpe d'Huez with Sexy Boy by Air playing in the background. Make it so!

If you want to make God laugh, tell him about how the forecast for Paris-Nice is “actually a lot better than usual” this week. x.com/ParisNice/stat…

Vingegaard producing best performance by a bloke in dungarees since Castorama-era Fignon

@Jacquie_BL From: Quitters Never Win: The (Adverse) Incentive Effects of Competing with Superstars by Jennifer Brown (Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 119, No. 5)

@Jacquie_BL General scoring average with Woods in field was 0.8 worse from 1999 to 2006 when he was in field. There was similar study on Jumbo Ozaki in Japan, with similar results. But I think there are confounding factors (e.g. which courses were on Tiger’s schedule etc.)

Debate about dominant icons attracting/repelling rumbles on (inc. in @cycling_podcast this week), but organisers' perspective clear in this from Mauro Vegni to @nieuwsbladsport: "There was Pogačar & that was all I needed. The race was on everyone's lips, from BBC to NY Times."

@the_ripoman @ITV 🥲tell me about it!

@friebos The nightmare we all knew was going 2 happen to UK cycling has become reality @friebos. Without your @itv coverage we are left only with @tntsports which is ok for the live afternoon broadcast but Paris-Nice week coincides with champs league so theres no evening catch up program

@Roanj Thanks, Rory. Yeah, I think I touched on this in last chapter. Was just thinking yesterday that l’m relieved my instincts in 2022 were right - he’d finally found people who had his best interests at heart, especially his manager. Should probably write a potscript at some point.

@friebos What a brilliant book. Poor Jan. You might have been asked before, but they way Armstrong has reached out to Ullrich in his troubles, did you ever feel it may be partly fueled by guilt?

@krisevans I think the dominant figure in race-type sports becomes a sort of bait/moving target. There’s a similar phenomenon with youngest siblings being the best in family - theory is they spend a lot of time chasing brothers/sisters!

@friebos Interesting, I’d bet that phenomenon is down to how the sport is played, in golf you play a whole round with just one person (usually), likely the dominant figure if you any good, in the others you always compete as a group, easier to maintain your confidence there than 1v1

@Roanj @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport Bleak stuff!🤣

@friebos @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport There's a line from your book on Ullrich that always comes to mind, along the lines of "As sure as rubber meets the road, the truth always comes out"

@Roanj @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport That’s another legitimate topic - whether people are suspicious or not. Dare say we’ll also have that debate (again) in coming months.

@friebos @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport Very true. See Schumacher at Ferrari. Another point, I was at Hautacam this year, fantastic day, great spectacle. But as an old fan, I knew what happened at the bottom, Narvaez, leading out Pog, was indentical to the Alpe in '01. So there maybe some cynicism in the mix as well.

@SimonBowen7 @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport 100% fair. It’s fascinating, how differently people feel about this. Off mic we also had conversation about how, to me, Pog still feels like an underdog - because he’s from a smallish country, is up against the weight of history/logic etc. All depends on narratives we all create!

@friebos @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport The outcome is the same though, and that's the problem. There's no suspense to me whether Pog goes from 100km/70km/40km when the result is the same.

@Roanj @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport Think that’s a fair point. Another thing we didn’t touch on yesterday is that Italians are more inclined to hero-worship than almost any other country I know, hence why Pog is a big turn-on for them.

@friebos @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport I think these icons, be it Armstrong, Pog etc, attract fans to the sport just to see those individuals, and when they go, so will those fans. Its the older or longer term fans that have more of an issue with the lack of suspense.

@SimonBowen7 @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport Fair enough. I don‘t think you can say there‘s ‘no suspense’ in waiting for the moment though.

@friebos @cycling_podcast @nieuwsbladsport I feel like you missed the point when discussing the suspense of the two races comparing the men's and women's race. The suspense comes from not knowing who is going to win, which the women's race gave us. There's no suspense in waiting for Pog to make his move.

That‘s organisers’, not organiser’s (i.e. just RCS). ASO and the Tour probably the only ones who have luxury of not caring who wins.

@elainemaczero Decathlon set fastest time at first split then imploded, or rather Hoole rode whole team off his wheel with 5km to go.

@friebos I was only half watching. How did one man get a ‘team’ time?

Dan Hoole says stuff your team time trial