Spin Cycle: A load of old cobblers

Spin Cycle is Escape Collective ’s news digest, published every Monday and Friday. You can read it on the website(obviously) or click here_to have it delivered straight to your inbox._

Hello!

Welcome back to Spin Cycle.

Well, it's been an eventful Holy Week to say the least, mostly thanks to the Basque Country and its particular brand of dangerous chaos. Oh, and with the hype train pulling into its station.

But after a quick splash of water in the face (although not from the Ineos soigneur at Itzulia, hopefully) we are refocused on the cobbles to come at Paris-Roubaix, which is where we begin today.

A load of old cobblers 🪨

We feel somewhat relaxed about the potential outcomes heading into Sunday's Paris-Roubaix Hommes. A Tadej Pogačar or Mathieu van der Poel victory brings historic achievements closer to reality. For Pogačar, he completes the Monument set and also the single-season grand slam is on, while Van der Poel would equal the record four wins set by Roger De Vlaeminck and Tom Boonen. And if someone else wins it, then that would be bloody fantastic.

But before Sunday's action, there are a couple of smaller storms raging. The first concerns people stealing cobblestones from the race route.

During pre-race checks (of which there are multiple ahead of the flag drop), cobblestones were found to have been removed from the heinous Trouée d'Arenberg and Carrefour de l'Arbre sectors, with ASO's Thierry Gouvenou criticising this thievery in an interview with De Telegraaf.

"It is incomprehensible that they are not thinking about the consequences that could have for the race. That is bound to cause crashes in the women's and men's races on Sunday. What those people are doing can be life-threatening," Gouvenou said. "Just imagine what happens if they ride into a hole like that… They are riding at speeds of 50 km/h over this section."

But organisers have also made changes to this year's cobbles, first reported by DH Les Sports+. In response to rider complaints that the cobblestone trophies awarded to the winners are too heavy, smaller versions have been created this year.

To be fair, they are pretty big.

So, if everyone could leave the cobbles alone for the next couple of days that would be great so they can rest up ahead of Sunday. Thanks.

Mysteries still unsolved 🕵️‍♂️

We dislike loose ends here at Spin Cycle. They confuse us. We prefer linear narrative threads for us to oversimplify, thank you very much.

Here's the latest from the East Flanders Public Prosecutor's Office, who are certainly having a "look at me" moment in the aftermath of riders running a level crossing at last weekend's Tour of Flanders.

"The offenders have all been identified in the meantime, and an official report is currently being drawn up," the Prosecution Service announced in a press release, with 54 riders reportedly identified. Any criminal prosecution will be decided "based on the investigation and further findings". We've never been so apprehensive and nervously excited for a report to drop. We still can't believe they're going to try and haul Remco and Tadej up in front of a judge.

And then, we have a second mystery partially solved. After two weeks, footage has finally emerged giving us a better angle of Remco Evenepoel's weird crash at Catalunya, which gives some credence to the Belgian's explanation, but still has us watching multiple replays trying to wrap our heads around what we're seeing.

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