Cycling Legends Podcast

The garlic bread and olives of Australia and the Middle East are done and the main course of single-day racing in northern Europe is about to be served. Chris, David and Gary look ahead to Openingsweekend and the Spring Classics in general.

📸 The single-day race first known as Omloop Van Vlaanderen was first held in 1945, becoming the somewhat more familiar Het Volk two years later before adopting its current guise as Omloop Het Nieuwsblad in 2009. The 1947 edition was won by the man shown here, Albert Sercu, pictured after winning that year’s Dwars door België (Dwars door Vlaanderen today), just a week earlier. If you think the family name sounds familiar then you’d be right. Albert’s son who was 2 years old when the photo was taken would go on to dominate the six-day track scene, as well as being a multiple Giro and Tour stage winner. His name? Patrick, of course. (Credit: KOERS Museum of Cycle Racing collection via Creative Commons licence CC BY-SA 4.0. Colourised by Cycling Legends Media 2026)

RECOMMENDATIONS AND SHAMELESS PLUGS
Beatles Anthology (Disney+) - https://www.disneyplus.com/en-gb/browse/entity-cab32c53-c3f8-4879-86f5-c8e4a1657338
No One Rides Alone - The Tour de MMN 2025 Film - https://tinyurl.com/MTMONFilm
Making the Most of Now - Chris Philips Interview - https://shows.acast.com/64ef4b8cf714670011477528/685d22f07cd58072a5d346a1

Tom Simpson Cycling Festival, 6-13 September 2026
Get your tickets at https://cyclinglegends.co.uk/pages/tom-simpson-cycling-festival?srsltid=AfmBOoq-lT3u_RBugJadNdxjeqxs2gMMgDSi76UxYSxouqb74SFjvAyH

The Equation Live - Thursday 26 February
Join Richard Oakes and Chris Sidwells at the Clubhouse, Putney Embankment, London SW15 - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-equation-live-tickets-1981846220395?aff=ebdssbcategorybrowse&fbclid=IwdGRjcAP6sflleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEem4CUFWkDy-e7LtwQSSD_2TwtyoXYsrKjKRAGu0tHR8Qbb1hqM-oo1AahnL4_aem_cN55QHZE0pn-tt5Z1-X2fw

Get in touch
Drop us a line at [email protected]! Whether it’s your best of/worst of 2025 or just general bike chat, we’d love to hear from you.

Social media
Cycling Legends - The untold story, the unseen photos
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cyclinglegendsmedia?igsh=MW9ldTNhemF6aWVlcA==
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/CyclingLegendsMedia?
X/Twitter @cyclinglegends1

Web
https://www.cyclinglegends.co.uk
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kicking off 2026, Chris Sidwells hosted an evening at the Clubhouse in Putney, starring Simpson Nouvelles Cycling’s Erin Avill, team owner and manager David Walters, Luca Kuhn, CEO and founder of team apparel partner Luca, and Tara Andrews, Marketing Director of Raptor, whose bikes the team will ride this season.

Music: “Starry Eyes” by A Month of Sleep, courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com.

Your fit, your ride, your Raptor. Discover the bikes made to move with you at www.raptorbikes.cc

Luca’s cycling apparel fuses cutting-edge materials with understated, performance-driven design. Extensively researched and engineered for women in both road cycling and spinning, Luca empower women to ride without limits. Check out the range at https://www.rideluca.com/

Supporters Club
You can join the Club for as little as £10 and help support the development of women’s U23 cycling. https://www.nouvellescycling.co.uk/supporters-club

Merch
Show your support with some of our merch. As seen at races throughout 2025! Sign up for news and order Simpsons-Nouvelles merch at https://nouvellescycling.co.uk/merch

Get on line!
Website www.nouvellescycling.co.uk
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/NouvellesCycling?
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/NouvellesCycling
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is something rotten in the state of Denmark’s GC hero’s team? Just what does it take to impress Roger De Vlaeminck? Not an eighth world cyclocross title, it appears. Have cycling fans gone mad (again)?

Chris, David and Gary ponder all this and more in the latest Feed Zone.

📸 He is perhaps regarded more highly as a coach/DS, but with no fewer than 4 Tour de France winners under his tutelage, Cyrille Guimard was no slouch on the bike, winning 7 Tour de France and 2 Vuleta a Espana stages between 1970 and 1974. Pictured here at the start of stage 1a of the 1973 Tour at Scheveningen in the Netherlands, Guimard is in conversation with that other legendary DS, Peter Post. (Credit: Bert Verhoeff for Anefo (Dutch National Archives))

RECOMMEDATIONS AND SHAMELESS PLUGS

Tom Simpson Cycling Festival, 6-13 September 2026
Get your tickets at https://cyclinglegends.co.uk/pages/tom-simpson-cycling-festival?srsltid=AfmBOoq-lT3u_RBugJadNdxjeqxs2gMMgDSi76UxYSxouqb74SFjvAyH

The Equation Live - Thursday 26 February
Join Richard Oakes and Chris Sidwells at the Clubhouse, Putney Embankment, London SW15 - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-equation-live-tickets-1981846220395?aff=ebdssbcategorybrowse&fbclid=IwdGRjcAP6sflleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEem4CUFWkDy-e7LtwQSSD_2TwtyoXYsrKjKRAGu0tHR8Qbb1hqM-oo1AahnL4_aem_cN55QHZE0pn-tt5Z1-X2fw

'Seeing' - Jose Saramago - https://amzn.eu/d/0iCnFEtG

Get in touch
Drop us a line at [email protected]! Whether it’s your best of/worst of 2025 or just general bike chat, we’d love to hear from you.

Social media
Cycling Legends - The untold story, the unseen photos
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cyclinglegendsmedia?igsh=MW9ldTNhemF6aWVlcA==
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/CyclingLegendsMedia?
X/Twitter @cyclinglegends1

Web
https://www.cyclinglegends.co.uk
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The world is all over the place and cycling is not immune from the madness. Jay Vine finds a new way to crash in Australia, Lucinda Brand is suddenly rubbish* in Belgium and British Cycling finds a way to slight the nation’s best cyclocross racer. Again.

(*Yes, we’re kidding - she’s still ace.)

📸 Victor Harbour, South Australia, 21 January 1999: Stuart O’Grady takes stage 3 on the inaugural Santos Tour Down Under and with it the leader’s Ochre Jersey, which he will wear for the remainder of the race.

Recommendations
Sarah Hammer fundraiser - https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-sarah-hammers-journey/cl/s?utm_campaign=fp_sharesheet&utm_medium=customer&utm_source=copy_link&lang=en_GB

Huberman Labs - Dorian Yates https://open.spotify.com/episode/14mWkxOpbERlXHLqDA6FyI?si=xIQRcGMiTTagXAVUw7EhyA&pi=J7yK-rYIQ8Wcq&t=0
David’s Substack - https://dstanley.substack.com/
Sonnet:visioN- https://youtube.com/@sonnetvision?si=fW20mL_rcYd2765m
Jeff Bogle - ‘Street Cats and Where to Find Them’ https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/jeff-bogle/street-cats-where-to-find-them/9780762489145/

Get in touch
Drop us a line at [email protected]! Whether it’s your best of/worst of 2025 or just general bike chat, we’d love to hear from you.

Social media
Cycling Legends - The untold story, the unseen photos
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cyclinglegendsmedia?igsh=MW9ldTNhemF6aWVlcA==
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/CyclingLegendsMedia?
X/Twitter @cyclinglegends1

Web
https://www.cyclinglegends.co.uk

An Afternoon With Chris Sidwells - Sunday 8 February 2026, Marsden, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire
Join Chris as he delves into the complex, fascinating world of cycling’s greatest icons, sharing untold stories and unseen photos from some of the most iconic riders and races.
https://www.marsdenmechanics.co.uk/events/cycling-legends-an-afternoon-with-chris-sidwells/
Laatste Ronde https://youtube.com/@laatsteronde?si=Z0dMJH40p2WcC3_B
Dr John Cooper Clarke - Haiku #1 - https://youtu.be/hkH9BHS-ph4?si=Qpx7beyLJXRPpLbY
John Cooper Clark ‘I Wanna Be Yours’ - https://store.johncooperclarke.com/products/i-wanna-be-yours-paperback-book-djc
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The chimes of a new year have barely stopped their ringing and it’s already kicking off in the world of cycling. Join Chris, David and Gary as they try to make sense of a Kerstperiode packed with ‘cross, contract buy-outs and contract bye-byes. Why are riders simply packing it in? Will Belgium be relegated to “guest nation” status in cyclocross? And does Axel Merckx have a type? We think so!

📸 Celebrating New Year with champagne is traditional, but how about celebrating with champagne IN Champagne? On stage 3 of the 2022 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig did exactly that, outsprinting Marianne Vos and Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio with a late attack on the uphill drag into Épernay. (Credit: ASO)

Recommendations
The Last Class - https://www.thelastclassfilm.com/
Jon Batiste - Für Elise - https://youtu.be/-5YRhvH6Uys?si=DHwI0l6c6LOKTVvnn
Protein: Everything We Need to Know (Channel 4, UK only) - https://tinyurl.com/yc2xpmnt
The Packfiller Perspective - https://youtube.com/@packfiller?si=WPzN9_zFmGbwEstC
The Vintage Space: Absurdly Deep Dive into Apollo 13 - https://youtu.be/gQUHVYYHTb0?si=N8_KzxmwXD2YLWQ

Get in touch
Drop us a line at [email protected]! Whether it’s your best of/worst of 2025 or just general bike chat, we’d love to hear from you.

Social media
Cycling Legends - The untold story, the unseen photos
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cyclinglegendsmedia?igsh=MW9ldTNhemF6aWVlcA==
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/CyclingLegendsMedia?
X/Twitter @cyclinglegends1

Web
https://www.cyclinglegends.co.uk

An Afternoon With Chris Sidwells - Sunday 8 February 2026, Marsden, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire
Join Chris as he delves into the complex, fascinating world of cycling’s greatest icons, sharing untold stories and unseen photos from some of the most iconic riders and races.
https://www.marsdenmechanics.co.uk/events/cycling-legends-an-afternoon-with-chris-sidwells/
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.