9. Snow and Nice

March 17 | Geraint Thomas’s victory in Paris-Nice is the main talking point in this week’s Telegraph Cycling Podcast. Hosts Richard Moore, Lionel Birnie and Daniel Friebe discuss what it means for the Welshman, who managed something Bradley Wiggins never did – he beat Alberto Contador.

Contador threw everything he had at Thomas, but the Team Sky rider held on for a career best victory. The only aspect that detracted from Thomas’s win was the cancellation, because of bad weather, of one of the key mountain stages. Would he have held off Contador if the Spaniard had had more climbs to launch attacks?

The new ‘extreme weather protocol’ has been in the news in Italy, too, with Sunday’s stage of Tirreno-Adriatico cancelled due to fears of snow. This was controversial, with Vincenzo Nibali complaining that the snow didn’t materialise, and that the cancellation deprived him of a chance of winning. Other riders then berated Nibali for putting his chances of victory before the safety of his peers.

On the podcast we hear from David Millar, the retired British rider who was involved in drawing up the extreme weather protocol.

Finally, there is a full preview of this weekend’s first Monument, Milan-San Remo, including an interview with this year’s bookies’ favourite, Alexander Kristoff of Norway, who looks back on his 2014 win and discusses what it takes to win La Classicissima.

The Telegraph Cycling Podcast is supported by Trainer Road and Eurosport