
And, breathe. After the mayhem of the Tour de France and the Tour de France Femmes, then the endless super-World Championships, we all needed a week off. It's silly season, come on! We need to do more talking about *checks notes* how important Max Walscheid to Jayco-AlUla is. However, the world of cycling never stops, not really.
This week we had the bleak news that former British Cycling and Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman received a four-year doping ban for his role in ordering banned substances to the governing body’s HQ in 2011, and that German cyclist Michel Hessmann has been provisionally suspended by his team, Jumbo-Visma, after he returned a positive anti-doping test result.