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On the evening of Tuesday 23 May 2019, Ben Hetherington’s life changed forever.

Ben, then 23-years-old and one of the most exciting young prospects in British cycling, was racing a local 10-mile time trial when he was struck by a motorist who turned right across the carriageway’s eastbound lanes after failing to give way. Ben suffered serious, life-threatening injuries in the crash, including a traumatic brain injury, and spent several weeks in an induced coma and three months in hospital. He eventually returned to para-cycling and continues to pick up top results.

However, after the motorist was cleared in the criminal courts, Ben pursued civil proceedings against the driver – who then claimed the cycling club who organised the time trial (and Ben) were actually the ones at fault. Earlier this year, the driver’s case was dismissed in what has been described as an “important decision” for grassroots cycling clubs.

Ryan sat down with two lawyers who worked on the case, Laura Murphy and Martin Porter, to discuss what that judgement means for time trialling in Britain, for cycling clubs staging any kind of event on open roads, and for the volunteers who help make it all possible – and also why cyclists should expect better from the police investigating crashes.

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How do you go about building a Tour de France team effectively from scratch? That’s the question I asked when I popped around to the rest day hotel of Julian Alaphilippe’s Tudor Pro Cycling squad, who are making their debuts at this year’s Tour.

The Swiss team are relative newbies to the sport, only launching under the Tudor name in 2022, two years after classics legend and national hero Fabian Cancellara took over the Swiss Academy Racing project. The squad then stepped up to the second-tier ProTeam level the following year, and has enjoyed something of a meteoric rise to the top of the sport, making their Giro debut last year, before being invited to the 2025 Tour.

On this week’s episode, I chat to Tudor CEO Raphael Meyer about the team’s growth and how you get ready for a race as big as the Tour de France.

I clambered up into the team truck, to have a nosey at the squad’s bikes and wheels, and to chat to their head mechanic Diego Costa about what it takes to put together a Tour de France bike.

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Tadej Pogačar, already four stage wins to the good this year and chasing his fourth Tour de France title at the age of just 26, is busy cementing his status as one of cycling’s greatest ever riders, with yet another dominant, cannibal-esque performance at the sport’s biggest race.

But is Pogačar’s relentless dominance hurting the race? And is he just too good? That’s the big debate featured on the latest episode of the road.cc Podcast, where Ryan is in the Pyrenees following the Slovenian’s exploits this week.

Ryan also chats with one of the big stars of the first two weeks of the Tour, Ben Healy, whose swashbuckling, attacking displays were rewarded with a stage win and two days in the yellow jersey.

After relinquishing yellow on Hautacam, Healy reflected on his spell leading the Tour and why he’s looking forward to getting back to doing what he does best: attacking.