Tour de Perth: Paul van der Ploeg talks about crashing on Stage 3 by SBS

With the 14-race National Road Series (NRS) kicking off in Perth, Cycling Central gets local for this week’s podcast, chaired once again by the man with the inimitable Canadian accent (at least in the SBS office, anyway) and online editor-in-chief, Phil Gomes, and flanked by Sarah van Boheemen and Anthony Tan.

We open with a cross to Al Hinds, our man on the ground for the four-day Tour de Perth, who finds himself stranded on Rottnest Island. Teething problems in the opening race of the NRS, we ask Al? You betcha, baby!

Next up, we raise the topic of Peter Sagan, fresh off a midweek win at the Brabantse Pijl in Belgium, who, together with second place-getter and world road champ Philippe Gilbert, appear odds-on favourites to win Sunday’s Amstel Gold Race in the Netherlands only hilly region of Limburg.

And last, the topic of Lycra – or rather lack of it – comes to the fore, after Sydney Morning Herald bike blogger Michael O’Reilly penned a much-debated column this week that was headlined, “Do we need to ‘de-Lycrafy’ cycling?”

Tour de Perth: Jack Anderson (Budget Forklifts) at Rottnest Island by SBS

Can a cheeky butt-pinch overshadow the centenary year of one of the biggest one-day races in world cycling?

If you ask Cycling Central online editor-in-chief Phil Gomes and his politically correct cohorts Al Hinds and Anthony Tan, the answer is a conclusive maybe.

Yes, Fabian Cancellara had barely blown out the candles after a scintillating second win at last weekend's Tour of Flanders before the Twitterverse launched into overdrive and lambasted second placegetter Peter Sagan to the nth degree... halting their tweets of hate till a heartfelt mea culpa on YouTube from the Slovak, who looked a slender shadow of his former hard-as-nails self.

Besides musing over Peter's Impertinent Pinch, the trio discuss the fallout from the men's and women's Tour of Flanders, and, with the Queen of the Classics just days away, they ready themselves for the 111th edition of Paris-Roubaix, wondering whether anyone can come close to Spartacus.

On an aside, they wonder what the addition of the Giro d'Italia to Cadel Evans' race schedule means - is it a subtle hint to move aside for BMC leader-in-waiting Tejay van Garderen, or does management still believe the 2011 Tour champion can repeat his feat of two years ago?

On the eve of SBS's live broadcast of a race every quintessential hard man of cycling wants to win, Cycling Central online editor-in-chief Phil Gomes sits down with Al Hinds and Anthony Tan to wax lyrical about an event the locals adorn with the sobriquet 'Vlaanderen's Mooiste' (Flanders' finest), and where the irrepressible Peter Sagan goes in as favourite this Sunday in the centenary year of the Tour of Flanders.

The trio also discuss a news story on the Cycling Central website that has so far generated more commentary than any other the entire week, 'Seeing red: why cyclists ride through traffic lights', penned by Marilyn Johnson, Research and Policy Manager at the Amy Gillett Foundation.

On the eve of the first cobbled WorldTour race of 2013, E3 Harelbeke, Mathew Hayman spoke to Cycling Central about Team Sky's revamped approach to the spring this season, and his hopes of still cracking the big time at the age of 34.

Let's Get Loud!

This is what happens when you shove four ego-laden male sports journalists in a small room and ask them to talk for an hour...

Chaired by Cycling Central online editor-in-chief Phil Gomes, with Stuart Randall, Al Hinds and Anthony Tan sharing the other three walls, the quartet first review an epic edition of 'La Primavera', analysing the heroes, villains and victims of last weekend's Milan-San Remo; then, for reasons still unknown to all of them, choose to take a different tack and discuss what, if anything, may come of Nikki Vance's pending review of the people and practices of Orica-GreenEDGE.

Australian cyclist Trent Lowe has experienced a turbulent recent past on the road but he’s now casually returned to a sport where he showed much early promise, mountain biking.

There's rarely a dull moment in the world of professional cycling...

This week has so far turned out to be no different - especially when Andy Schleck abandons yet another race, and on top of that, was reportedly caught inebriated the night after his umpteenth DNF, this time at Tirreno-Adriatico (which later turned out to be untrue - the French politician who 'caught' him out later recanted his initial version of events).

Chaired by Cycling Central online editor-in-chief Phil Gomes and supported by loquacious sidekicks Al Hinds and Anthony Tan, the trio tear into the two week-long WorldTour stage races just past that are Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico, analysing the key players as well as the ones who put themselves through purgatory just to finish; they lament another DNF for the interminably beleaguered Schleck the Younger; then to end, and thankfully on a brighter note, they look ahead with gusto towards SBS' inaugural LIVE screening of Milan-San Remo on Sunday evening and what 'La Classicissima' may bring.

Attention, attention: Cycling Central's Awesome Foursome, please go immediately to SBS Studio 9...

A heady four-pronged attack tackles the issues of the week in this edition of the Cycling Central podcast.

Led by Cycling Central Web frontman Phil Gomes with backup vocals courtesy of Al Hinds, Sarah van Boheemen and Anthony Tan, the quartet muse over the choice between riding Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico and which race is better for whom; World Series Cycling - is it destined for the same ignominious fate as World Series Cricket?; based on what Sarah and Tanny saw at the Tour de Langkawi and the Armstrong revelations, do we now question every surprise performance we see?; and finally, the debate over the (over)use of race radio between rider and sport director is reignited...