Welcome back to Lantern Rouge Cycling Podcast, the recap of Volta Algarv and UAE Tour final stages.

We had a very nice Sunday of racing, pretty exciting, especially with some big riders all competing,

showing their shape before the bigger races being opening weekend and also, well, not on opening weekend,

the French classics, which a lot of these punchers will do, and then Strata Bianca afterwards.

So we'll actually start with Algarv because it was by far the most interesting stage today

and a different approach to Mayo.

We had a breakaway Benji with Shackman, Alaphilippe, Tratnik, and Tobias Bayer.

So Tudor, Bora, Quickstep, Alpacin, Shacklin was pretty tight on GC though.

Yes indeed. I don't know the exact gap by heart, but basically in that breakaway, he grew into the virtual leaders jersey. So at a certain point he was leading the race also on the second last Mayawu climb. So pretty far into the race with 45 kilometers to go, it was looking pretty vibrant for Schauchman, but then again, the break is often getting a bit of a leash and getting that freedom of okay, you can have the virtual leader jersey a little bit. I don't think the peloton was overly worried either about Schachman to the point that they were panicking

about it.

Don't really see that here, but I think it's fair to say the action, and I think also the broadcast

started on the first Mayao climb, which is the second last Mayao climb with roughly 45-ish

kilometers to go.

And we saw in the breakway ahead that Schman and Alafalip were dropping Trotnik

and Beyer. This is relevant. And then in the group behind, we saw UAE rider pacing. Then we go

back to the breakaway. We go back to the Peloton. And I see another UAE rider pacing. And I'm like,

okay, that's a small group. Wait a second. That's all made-up basing already.

On the second-last climb, Patrick.

What's happening?

Was there bonus seconds at the top?

I actually don't know,

but I think there were enough people ahead so that they wouldn't matter for the GC riders.

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