A Rest‑Day Chat With Whitey: Old Mates, New Chapters and the Giro That Never Lets Go

I recorded a chat with a great friend of mine, Matt White, last night on the rest day of the

Giro. It felt like slipping straight back into an old rhythm. I’ve spent so many Giro stages with Whitey in the car over the years that I can still picture the way he grips the steering wheel when the race gets spicy, or the way he’ll suddenly go quiet when he’s reading the flow of the bunch. He loves this race like no other. It’s in his bones. Italy shaped him as a rider and then again as a director, and even now you can hear the affection in his voice when he talks about the place. The chaos. The beauty. The food. The weather that can turn on you like a dodgy ex. He thrives on it.

One of the things I appreciate most about Whitey is how easy he is. I could literally shoot him a WhatsApp message saying, “You up for a chat on the pod mate?” and he’ll come back straight away with, “Sure mate, wanna do it today?” No fuss. No dramas. No media manager running interference. He’s always keen to jump on, even when he’s in the middle of a Grand Tour with a million things going on. That’s just who he is. He shows up.

It’s obviously been a tough twelve months for him. GreenEDGE ended the 14 year journey just before the Giro last year, and that’s a hell of a chapter to close. I didn’t want to drill into the stories around that. Not because they aren’t important, but because sometimes you’ve got to rip out the rear‑vision mirror and look forward. I didn’t want the events of twelve months ago to cast a cloud over the incredible journey he helped shape. The wins. The heartbreaks. The culture. The laughs. The moments that made that team what it was. Whitey was at the centre of so many of them, and that deserves to stand on its own without being dragged back into the politics of how it ended.

What struck me last night was how energised he is at Movistar. New colours. New riders. New rhythms. But the same Whitey. You can tell he's super passionate to help shape a fresh culture into the organisation and we can already see it in the racing. As we discuss in the podcast, Whitey has an incredible ability to bring people together.

Given Matt has been involved with a ton of riders over the journey, I found his insights on Simon Yates's retirement facinating. Whilst the majority of the cycling public were taken back by the retirment of Simon Yates, it didn't surprise Whitey at all. His explination of the entire situation made total sense. In the end, no DS had more time with Simon so if anyone is qualified to chat about the situation its Whitey.

A few comments already have flagged that it felt like a chat between two mates. And thats exactly what it was. We shared old Giro stories, we spoke about our joint passion which is food, and hopefully people get a better insight into what goes into being a DS in the World Tour and how the sport has changed over the past five years.

If you want to hear the whole thing, the button below will take you straight there.

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