For Natalie Grinczer, the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift will be the first race for a new team Lifeplus-Wahoo after a mid-season transfer from Stade Rochelais Charente-Maritime. She had joined the French team for the 2022 season and raced the first edition of the women’s Tour with them but had to abandon on stage 3 due to crash injuries.
In an exclusive interview with Cyclingnews, Grinczer tells the story of why and how she got a spot on her new team, what her goals are for the Tour – and how she balances cycling with her actual job of being a physio.
When Stade Rochelais Charente-Maritime were overlooked for a wildcard invitation for the 2023 Tour de France Femmes, Grinczer had prepared herself mentally for it and was happy to stay with the team. But she hadn’t counted on the team curtailing its season for financial reasons and went looking for an opportunity to keep racing.
“I was obviously disappointed when I saw that we weren’t in the Tour, but it wasn’t my plan to transfer mid-season. I was quite settled there. But the day after Nationals, we heard that the team was in financial difficulty and that we wouldn’t have any races for the rest of the year. I had been in contact with Tom Varney [Lifeplus-Wahoo general manager] previously and mentioned the situation, and we just got talking from there. They had a space for me and were willing to take me at short notice, it was sort of a whirlwind. Within two weeks, I went from ‘you won’t race anymore this season’ to ‘would you want to go to the Tour’ – and I’m not going to say no to that. I just feel really lucky,” Grinczer explains.
Her second Tour de France Femmes will be an opportunity to make better memories after she crashed on stage 2 of the 2022 edition. She abandoned the race during stage 3 due to her injuries, having fractured her arm and her pelvis in the crash.
“It was really hard to take because we had really prepared properly for the Tour, looked at the courses, did loads of training camps, and then for that to just happen … I was in total denial to start with. I started the third day and rode like 100 km before the guy in the broom wagon told me to get in. I just kept riding away from them. But I had so much pain, I knew I couldn’t do anything. I guess when I was riding away from the broom wagon that day, I was just processing it in my mind.”
A year later, Grinczer is on the start line in France again with some unfinished business. She isn’t targeting a specific result but will support her new teammates – and hopes to get free rein if she has a particularly good day.
“Everyone wants to finish the Tour, but I think to have one good day, maybe get in a move that stays away, have a good placement one of the days, I would consider that a success. If I can seek out opportunities on the days I feel strong, that would be really nice. But it works both ways – we have some really strong climbers, so I will support them until I can’t anymore. If we have achievable team goals, we should fully commit to those, and it will be good for the team and for our sponsors.”
Up until now, all this sounds like a typical pre-race interview. However, Grinczer is not a full-time pro cyclist – she is working as an NHS physio in the United Kingdom and cycling in her spare time, fitting races and training camps in around her work.
“I’m working just under full-time hours, so I’d have a day or two off in the mid-week where I’d do longer rides, and everything else would just be, coming back from work, getting changed and training, literally like that. If I stopped and sat down in between, that would be it,” Grinczer describes her training routine.
"I have a very supportive employer, and I just tell them when I’m there and I’m not. I present them with my shifts, and as soon as I come home from a race, I just go back to work straight away. We’re quite flexible with our shifts as well, so I can work fewer days but more hours and just treat that as a rest day off the bike, freeing up another training day,” says Grinczer, laying out a double schedule that probably would overwhelm many others.
After her active cycling career, Grinczer can see herself combining her two lines of occupation.
“I helped our soigneurs out a few times when I was injured. It is something that I would look into when I’m retired, staying in the sport and just giving a bit back because I feel like I know what riders need and when they need it,” she says.
First, though, she wants to focus on cycling and is targeting a full-time cycling contract for the 2024 season. Grinczer says that her training loads wouldn’t increase that much, but that she would then be able to do all the other things her current work-cycling balance leaves her no time for.
“I could get proper rest and look into things off the bike, like conditioning, strength training, bike fits, time trial, maybe less stressful travel, recon races, go to training camps more freely, take to altitude, to be better prepared for the racing,” Grinczer lists the things that other Tour starters may take for granted.
Something Grinczer has in common with several other riders in the Tour peloton, however, is that cycling wasn’t her first sport.
“I played hockey at school and at college, training six days a week, so I was always doing something. My dad used to race when he was younger, so it was always normal in our house. I started joining the local club runs and was trying to do both, I’d ride for three hours in the morning and then go and play a hockey match and not understand why I was so tired … eventually I just preferred the bike. I like the freedom of it. I’m not a very interesting person, but when I’m out riding or racing, that’s how I express myself. Sometimes you’re feeling a lot of emotions or a lot of stress, and you can just get it out on the bike and become relaxed,” she describes how she can use the bike as an outlet before going on to lay out her early career.
“I started doing races at university and got picked up by an amateur team. We went to the Rás na mBan, I won a stage by accident, and WNT picked me up. They were still a British amateur team then, evolved into a UCI team, I was with them for three years in total. I went on to Bizkaia-Durango, and then I was on CAMS-Tifosi. The guys there, it’s DAS-Handsling now, they have really like big hearts, they are really interested in helping riders as much as they can, and they do all they can with their finances and give riders opportunities to go to big races. So thanks to them as well,” Grinczer gives a shout-out to her former team.
The Rás na mBan (Irish for “women’s race”) is one of her favourite races. With six stages on five days, the Irish non-UCI race is an important development ground for British and Irish riders as they can test themselves against guest riders like Christine Majerus, Nina Kessler, Roxane Fournier, Tayler Wiles, Julie Leth, Alice Barnes, Elinor Barker, or Coralie Demay.
“It’s a really good race, and a lot of British teams take their riders over there. You just learn about stage racing, racing in general, into good habits. The organisation is super friendly. People come out to watch it, everyone is really interested in the race. It’s a good one to go to, especially for the younger riders, because the courses are hard, and there’s something for everyone, TT, crits, some mountain finishes. It’s a really good race, and I’m happy that it still goes on,” Grinczer reminisces about her six participations in Ireland where she finished in the top 10 five times, took home the mountain jersey once, and, most importantly, won a stage that kick-started her cycling career.-
Now, eight years after that stage win, it is time for Grinczer to start the Tour de France Femmes, again, hoping to reach the finish in Pau this time around.
