1. The season kicks off Down Under

Jan 29, 2015, 01:50 AM

January 29 | In the first Telegraph Cycling Podcast of 2015 the team of Richard Moore, Lionel Birnie and Daniel Friebe discuss the opening races of the season in Australia and Argentina.

There is an interview with Mark Cavendish, who got his first win of the year on the final day of the Tour de San Luis. Earlier in the week he was beaten on two occasions by the young Colombian sprinter Fernando Gavira, but should he be worried? Out of contract at the end of the year, 2015 is a huge season for Cavendish and we discuss his prospects.

Rohan Dennis was the winner of the Tour Down Under ahead of Sky’s Richie Porte and his BMC teammate Cadel Evans. It was a fast, aggressive race, with lots of talking points, not least the resurgent form of Jack Bobridge, a 25-year-old who seemed to be on his way out. We look ahead to his and Dennis’s attempts at the world hour record, and ask whether there might be a way back to Europe for Bobridge.

The Tour Down Under was Evans' final WorldTour race before he retires next month and we look back on the career of Australia's first and only Tour de France winner. Daniel also drops the bombshell that he was in the Mapei office on the day Evans signed for the Italian team in 2002, and sneaked a look at his contract... listen to the podcast to find out what it said.