BBC BeSpoke, Giro d'Italia
11th May 2018
Chris
Froome, by Jaguar
MENA, Flickr, Licence
CC
BY 2.0
We're being treated to a daily Giro
d'Italia podcast from BBC BeSpoke, for the duration of the
race. The host is the BBC's sports writer Tom Fordyce, with cycling
writer Jeremy Whittle the regular guest.
Fordyce pronounces 'Giro' with an extra-soft French 'g', rather
than the correct Italian sound, which is like the 'j' of Jeremy.
Some may cavil, but look at it this way: at least he's doing it in
Foreign.
The ITV4 Boardman/Boulting/Millar podcast is my favourite, but I'll
listen to any cycling broadcast, and the 2018 Giro promises
competition, suspense, and intrigue.
The trouble is, the early editions of Giro BeSpoke haven't included
much race coverage, or chat about any rider other than Chris Froome.
Fordyce and Whittle form a sort of Lady Macbeth & Macbeth
partnership, plotting to bring down the Kenyan-born Brit.
These are some of the episodes:
- Clouds hang over Team Sky at Giro in Israel (3rd May)
- Froome's bid for history off to a shaky start (4th May)
- Is it time for Froome to panic? (8th May)
- Froome's toothbrushing technique in doubt (9th May)
- Is Froome's halitosis alienating his teammates? (10th May)
Ok, I may have made up the last two, but the others are genuine.
Tuesday's 'panic?' broadcast was typical of the content served up
by the Chuckle Brothers. One loaded question after another from
Barry teed up one snide remark after another from Paul.
The first 4 minutes of the 20 were devoted to mean-spirited remarks
about the Sky leader; the Podcast Two then managed a minute and a
half on a different subject, before returning to their topic of
choice. 'From Froome's perspective, there's a horrible irony at work
here, isn't there, because [bla bla bla].' They did discuss other
riders, but every conversation came back to Chris Froome, and the
impending crisis predicted for him by Hardy.
You'd think there were no other riders in the race, and nothing
else happening. It's lazy and boring. What a load of rubbish.
Simon Yates is the Golden Boy as far as Morecombe and Wise are
concerned. That's fine, I'm delighted that the Bury rider is doing
so well. But Yates has had his own issues with asthma medication,
having been suspended for 4 months in 2016 for unintentional doping,
and it does seem hypocritical that that's never mentioned by Hale
and Pace.
No doubt Simon Yates is in his 'being built up' phase. It's not the
right time for him to be torn to shreds by Impartial Journalists.
Some day, when the bandwagon rolls past our fearless Woodward and
Bernstein, they'll jump on it. Gare à vous, when that day comes,
Simon.
The endless bitching about Team Sky almost made me want to start a
'Bring Back OJ Borg' petition. At least that way we'd get the
'iconic' count back up to acceptable levels. But then I remembered
that he's just as bad as Armstrong. (Armstrong & Miller, and
yes, it is time to stop now).
Instead, it'll have to be a 'Bring Back Rob Hayles' campaign.
