UNCHAINED REACTION

We asked Nick Christian to plant himself in front of the telly and binge-watch all eight episodes of Netflix's new documentary 'Tour de France: Unchained'. Does the long-anticipated show live up to the considerable hype?

- Nick Christian

Episode 1

The Grand Départ

Almost a year since the Tour de France 2022 concluded, its dramatised episodic version has landed. As an athletic spectacle we already know what will unfold over the next eight episodes - what I expect this binge to deliver is a caricatured version of the world's biggest bike race: the Tour de France, for want of more appropriate language, on steroids.

The principle limitation of Unchained, you may be aware, is that only certain teams have agreed to participate. It should come as no surprise that two of them belong to a couple of the loudest mouths in the business. Neither EF EducationEasyPost boss Jonathan Vaughters, nor Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl head honcho Patrick Lefevere is the peloton's Mr Popular, but they're solid choices as talking heads. Both have high hopes for the opening weekend. Vaughters is banking on his young TT specialist Stefan Bissegger, who is seen honing his position in a wind tunnel. He has been working towards this opening stage all year, we're told. Might that time have been better spent learning to corner in the rain? As Bissegger tumbles twice on wet road markings. Vaughters ask us to believe this is a rider going up to and over the limit. Lefevere sums up the surprise victory of Yves "I'm just a farmer's son from Belgium" Lampaert with uncharacteristic sentimentality. "It's always more beautiful when it's unexpected," he says. He clearly has a soft spot for Fabio Jakobsen, which is why he has been looking more towards the stage 2 sprint. We could all do without seeing his terrifying 2020 Tour of Poland crash several times more, but this part isn't for you or me, and it's what the 10-second skip button is for. This is for the uninitiated and about building up the fairy-tale finish in the land of Hans Christian Andersen.