The ENTIRE Vuelta a Espana - Jumbo Drama, Highlights, Winners, Losers, and What to Watch

My Issue is Sepp respected his teammates who were riding away from him by not chasing & bringing the competitors up w/ him & his teammates didn't return that respect.

Thanks for the recap (and for the TdF recap). I love your take as an alternative to the 1) GCN commentators, 2) Lantern Rouge detailed analysis and 3) general public chatter. Somewhere amidst all of those information channels lies the truth. I believe the Jumbo drama was probably a bit over-blown in the general public. I do believe that Jumbo did not expect to be in the position that they found themselves mid-race, with 3 legitimate potential winners and at that point, the management had likely not stepped-in and set the absolute direction for the team. I can't put too much blame on Jonas or Roglic as they came into the race as the declared co-leaders, so at that mid-point of the race, they had a reason to believe that they were still the declared leaders since no firm direction had come from management. It certainly did appear that both Jonas and Roglic were 'making their case' each with a stage win without being overly obvious in trying to bury their two teammates. That is when the team management stepped-in, which was the right thing. I am absolutely thrilled for Sepp....a fantastic rider who seems to have the admiration and respect of the entire peloton.

I think you guys had a great point regarding the ego and legacy comments. They appeared to be out for themselves rather than supporting someone they likely felt was below their ability or superstar status. I could be wrong, but that was the vibe I had from halfway around the world.

The Vuelta recap we needed but didn’t think was coming!! Could possibly be your best work…. But seriously, thanks!!!

That was a great video, really like Ben's input and views.

Simon Yates during the 2021 Giro had a similar hot and cold Grand Tour as Remco. Lost a lot of GC time and then won a stage

Thank you! With one thing and another I didn't really get to follow the Vuelta, and this was a great way to catch up while on the trainer. Will watch stage six with my wife; we both had fun watching Sepp at The Tour and that'll be fun to see. Dig the insight, context, analysis, and the two of you make an entertaining conversational duo.

Awesome commentary. Phil and Ben Show is very entertaining and also pretty spot on. The bonus topic pricked my ears at the end and I'm sure factored in this Vuelta, but I'm also thinking JV covered it in stride based on the reaction. Enjoyed this show immensely ❤

Just my opinion, but I believe the original TJV plan was for this to be Primoz’s race to win. Then Jonas decides he wants to ride and his wife says yeah he would like to win the Vuelta which probably tweaks Primoz’s ego (it would mine). So the Jonas/Primoz co-leader drama is setup. Then throw in the Remco factor, where he’s the threat to TJV and Stage 6 really turned things upside down. He went up the road with another TJV rider to counter Remco and Sepp ends up winding and after Remco loses 27 minutes, Sepp’s in the red jersey (totally unexpected by TJV management/Primoz/Jonas). I think it was totally unexpected that Sepp would be in the lead and not strictly in a domestic role. It took all the negative response to Jonas and Primoz not supporting the red jersey to turn things around and get them to support Sepp the ‘accidental’ red jersey. I do think prior to that Jonas and Primoz were still trying to put themselves into position to win. I do look for Primoz to move to another team.

Thank you for doing this!

I think for me the big thing that's wrong with the 'we're going to race for it' attitude on the Angliru is exactly what happened on stage 16 to Bejes. Because they weren't racing for it then. Jonas attacked, G2 syndrome took over, and Sepp and Roglic sat on the group like good teammates. Jonas didn't take 1:05 on Sepp that day because he was 1:05 stronger. He took that time because Sepp wasn't defending his jersey from him. Same thing happened on Tourmalet. Jonas was allowed to take about a minute before Sepp figured Mas/Ayuso were tired enough that he could go without dragging them with him. Those were Sepp's two biggest individual time losses to Jonas, both on stages where he couldn't ride his own race because of team tactics. I'm not saying Jonas wouldn't have taken time on Sepp to Bejes, but if Sepp were riding it would have most certainly been less. But he wasn't allowed to defend. So essentially he's gifting Jonas a portion of his gap at that point. I don't know how we get to the Angliru and decide that now it's ok to race for the jersey, when team tactics are what's brought the gap to Jonas down and not legs. If as soon as Remco had dropped out of GC the team had decided that the race was going to be a free-for-all that's fine, but they didn't do that. They continued to play team tactics the whole race up until Angliru. IMO as soon as Mas and Ayuso dropped early on Angliru it should have just been Jonas, Primoz, and Sepp working together to consolidate as much of a lead as possible for Sepp's jersey. At that point the GC is over with Ayuso as the next closest competitor ultimately falling to around 4 minutes behind. So I think at that point the jersey has to go to the guy who carried it to the point where all the actual rivals were eliminated. Which is Sepp. I'm glad they ultimately made the right decision in the end, but agree the team needs to exercise a bit more control over its superstar riders. They let it get way too close.

Really enjoyed your recap, thanks!

Hot take. It wasn't about Sepp, it was about Jonas vs. Primoz. Remember the previous stage Jonas went up the road, Primoz attacked the following group and got a gap and saw Sepp behind, so Primoz backed down and helped Sepp. Jonas then stomped the race and took back a bunch of time putting himself into second place. Next stage Primoz attacks, Jonas, follows and turns to see Sepp being dropped....but Jonas doesn't turn around (unlike Primoz the stage before). I assume it was Primoz going to take back his second place... And he wasn't going to slow down, Jonas didn't the day before. Which makes sense for both of them to say they want Sepp to win. They did. But not more than they wanted to be in front of each other. /shrug

Good work Phil!

Loved the recap. One slight correction, I believe its Pinot that has the goats. Although its easy to confuse the french hopeful that underachieves race after race

I think Remco on stage 13 sat up way earlier than only the last 20 minutes. He was down 1 to 2 minutes for a while and then quickly expanded.

Wait the last stage wasn't a procession haha Ganna, Remco, Kemna, Costa, Groves and Denz attacked with 30km to go and were holding 20 seconds for ages until the very end when the peloton was getting closer It was so exciting!

Great to see Ben again !!

Jonas was not tired at stage 18. He created a gap to have more than a 10 second gap to Sepp

“Has anybody ever been that hot and cold?” Yes. Floyd Landis, stages 16/17, TDF 2006. And we all know how that shook out.