The Cycling Podcast's 11-date Grand Tour of the United Kingdom and Ireland has reached its conclusion and Richard Moore and Lionel Birnie are back with an episode recapping the cycling news.

Former British national champion Adam Blythe joined us for two of our live shows – at London's Arts Theatre and the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester – and in this episode he speaks about the decision to retire from professional racing at the age of just 30.

Blythe talks about the moment he made the decision to retire and, having hosted a series of interviews for The Cycling Podcast in the spring, now sees opportunities in the media having also appeared on Eurosport's grand tour coverage.

We also have an extract from our first Friends of the Podcast special episode of 2020 – which tells the story of stage 19 of the Tour de France, when a hailstorm and landslide halted the race. We hear from Egan Bernal, who took the yellow jersey that day.

There's also a clip from our live show featuring Richard reading an entry from our new book The Grand Tour Diaries, also telling the story of the Tour's dramatic 19th stage.

This episode is also sponsored by Cyclist magazine. Give the gift of Cyclist Magazine – the stress-free present that lasts all year. Save up to £11.89 on an annual gift subscription to our favourite monthly read with free postage thrown in. Simple. Easy. Perfect. Go to www.cyclistmag.co.uk/podcast to subscribe for a year.

Our new book The Grand Tour Diaries is available now for £15. Richard, Lionel, Daniel, François and Orla document the 2018 and 2019 editions of the Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and Vuelta a España plus the Women's Tour. Order from thecyclingpodcast.com and get the book delivered to your door. The book is currently only available from our publishers, not from Amazon.

We're almost ready to launch our 2020 Friends of the Podcast programme. We've frozen the price and improved the delivery system. Stand by for details of our new faff-free system in next week's episode.

We are often asked about the music in our shows. The title music in our regular episodes is called This Is The Last Day Of Your Life by Glass Pear. There's a Spotify playlist featuring some of the music heard in The Cycling Podcast here.