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20 years ago, former England footballer, Crystal Palace captain, and cancer survivor Geoff Thomas first made his mark on the cycling world by completing all 21 stages and 3,593km of the 2005 Tour de France, a day before the Lance Armstrong-led peloton.

Since then, Thomas’s Tour 21 has developed into a huge deal, and every year groups of amateurs follow in his wheel tracks and ride the Tour route one week before the pros, raising millions of pounds for Cure Leukaemia. And this summer, Geoff marked two decades since his first French summer by riding his seventh Tour 21.

In a wide-ranging chat, Geoff discusses his own cancer story, the origins of his Tour rides, the highs and lows of 20 years of riding a bike around France, his experiences with a certain Texan, his relationship with cycling beyond the Tour, and why cycling in a group isn’t that far removed from being part of a football changing room.

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It may have been sorely lacking in recent years, but the 2026 edition of the Tour de France Hommes will be all about suspense. Or, as the race’s press release put it, it’s going to be a ‘crescendo’. Whether it’s one that could build to a great Alpine GC frenzy, or, if Tadej decides to clash the symbols sooner than anticipated, fade into a disappointing diminuendo, remains to be seen.
On this week’s episode, we offer our immediate reactions to the Tour Hommes route revealed this week, which features a Barcelona start, an early Pyrenean excursion, a backloaded double visit to Alpe d’Huez, and the return of the Montmarte finale in Paris.
We also provide some hot takes on what looks set to be a very exciting Tour de France Femmes in 2026, including its long-awaited trip to Mont Ventoux and a potentially explosive final stage in Nice.
Elsewhere, inspired by Remco Evenepoel’s redemptive downhill performance at Il Lombardia this month, Emily puts her sports psychology Masters to good use and offers some handy advice on how you too can overcome a heavy crash and regain your confidence on the bike.

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Following Israel-Premier Tech’s decision to change both its name and nationality for 2026, in the wake of a season dominated by protests and controversy surrounding the team’s participation in races amid the conflict in Gaza, former UCI president Brian Cookson joins us on the podcast to discuss one of cycling’s biggest talking points in recent years: sportswashing.

In a wide-ranging discussion, Cookson, who ran the UCI between 2013 and 2017 after 16 years at the helm of British Cycling, chats about the spectre of sportswashing in cycling, affecting both sponsorship and race locations, why nation states shouldn’t have their name on team jerseys, and how cycling’s stakeholders should deal with protests on the road.

Elsewhere in the podcast, we also discuss the state of professional cycling in 2025, how the sport has moved on from the doping era Cookson saw first-hand as UCI president, and where things are currently going right (and wrong) for cycling in the UK.