Tour de France: Unchained – Second series offers more emotions but also more crashes

The second series of ‘Tour de France: Unchained’ will be released on June 11, and the Netflix documentary offers another intense, emotional and dramatic insider view of the biggest race in professional cycling.

Last year, we compared the slick editing and constant showing of crashes and suffering to eating too much Haribo on a hot day. The second series offers more of the same, with the eight 45-minute episodes packed with best moments of racing, the crashes, the heartache and joy that the Tour always produces.

Tadej Pogačar and his UAE Team Emirates teams struck a deal to be filmed alongside the eight official teams, and so this year’s series tells a more complete story of his battle with Vingegaard and how Pogačar lost out in the time trial and then cracked on stage 17 over the  Col de la Loze.

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Mark Cavendish also features across several episodes that highlight the dangers of sprinting, including the moment when he crashed out on stage 8 after going close to victory on stage 7 in Bordeaux.

The tragic death of Gino Mäder at the Tour de Suisse is weaved into the narrative Tour de France Unchained, with a tearful interview with Pello Bilbao highlighting the fears and emotions in the peloton after the loss of the Swiss rider.

One of the most moving moments of series 2 captures the moment Ben O'Connor is told of Mäder’s death during a training ride. Julian Alaphilippe also reflects on the dangers of pro racing. "We are nothing on earth and even less on a bike. Just to evoke Gino gives me chills everywhere," he said.

Yet 'Tour de France: Unchained' also dramatizes numerous crashes in a jarring contradiction that could perhaps have been avoided. At the very least, the crashes could have been treated with more respect.

The crashes and serious injuries of the 2024 season have confirmed that the riders’ pain and suffering should never be used to ‘sell’ the sport, even to a broader audience on Netflix.

Despite that, the documentary is addictive and entertaining to watch, whatever your level of understanding of the sport, showing moments that are rarely seen on television or video. 

The Netflix camera crews again had all-area access to the eight teams and captured rarely-seen moments on team buses and even intimate moments between directeur sportif and riders on the massage table.

Each of the eight episodes combines different storylines covering the AG2R Citroën, Alpecin-Deceuninck, EF Education-EasyPost, Groupama-FDJ, Ineos Grenadiers, Bora-Hansgrohe, Jumbo-Visma and Soudal-QuickStep teams.

Their race tactics are studied in detail, with race commentary and scripted comments and considerations from French commentator Steve Chainel and Ireland’s Orla Chennaoui of Eurosport. Interviews at home, often done by their partners, reveal a more human face of the leading riders.

"Some of the eight episodes look like a dive into a pack of mixed feelings. Almost like being on a psychiatrist's couch, it's about grief, fear, anger, betrayal and pride," Christophe Bérard suggested in the French newspaper Le Parisien in one of the early reviews.

Team managers Jonathan Vaughters, Patrick Lefevere, Marc Madiot and Richard Plugge also feature, as they fight with each other and try to guide their riders to victory. Madiot’s disdain for Plugge after he accuses his riders and staff of drinking beer is ‘peak Madiot,’ packed with venom and pride.

Jumbo-Visma directeur sportif Grischa Niermann and his many exclamations of ‘Fuck!” in the team car again star, as does Pogačar’s foul-mouthed acceptance that he was done and his Tour de France challenge over. Not surprisingly Tour de France Unchained is rated 13+. 

The official trailer included a question to Thibaut Pinot about Vingegaard’s crushing time trial performance but did not reveal his answer.

It turns out the Frenchman preferred to enjoy his final Tour.

“Phew… I don’t want to answer that question. I’m not interested in that,” Pinot said. 

Madiot was not so diplomatic.

“There’s always a moment when the truth comes out, so we’ll see,” he said.

Vingegaard has always insisted he races clean and spoke directly to the Netflix camera about the 2023 allegations. 

“There’s no reason to be speculating. The past (history of cycling) is the only reason to speculate,” Vingegaard said.

“I know I don’t take anything. I’m not doing anything that I'm not allowed to do. I’m clean and even when they test these samples in 100 years, they won't find anything.”

Eight carefully scripted episodes

The eight episodes are an excellent way to look back at the 2023 Tour de France and prepare for this year’s race.

Episode one sets up the series and the Vinggaard-Pogačar battle with interviews with both riders from their homes and training camps, recalling Pogačar’s return from his scaphoid fracture at Liege-Bastogne-Liege.

It also captures the riders during a minute’s silence to remember Gino Mäder in their pre-race meeting with race organisers ASO in Bilbao, to introduce the crash narrative and reveal riders’ fears but also their determination to win.

Richard Carapaz crashed on stage one and the episode focuses on his subsequent abandon and how it wrecked EF Education-Easypost’s ambitions at the 2023 Tour de France.   

Episode two recalls Ben O’Connor emotional and physical struggles in the early stages in the Basque Country, while fellow Perth native and natural rival Jai Hindley won stage 5 and pulled on the yellow jersey.

The first sprint battles, Jasper Philipsen’s dominance and the many crashes fill episode two.

Fabio Jakobsen’s Tour de Pologne crash is shown again, while his high-speed crash on stage 4 is dissected and analysed in all its gory detail. Jakobsen accuses Philipsen of sparking the crash but he says: “We're not here to make friends with other teams.”

Cavendish’s crash and abandon is covered in the same episode, but the series ends with him promising to return to the 2024 Tour. 

Stage 4 is simply titled ‘For Gino’ and tells how the Bahrain Victorious riders try to win a stage to honour his memory, with Bilbao taking stage 10. 

The struggles at Ineos Grenadiers fills episode five, as Tom Pidcock fails to fight for GC and Carlos Rodriguez steps up and confirms his Grand Tour potential, winning stage 14 just 24 hours after Michał Kwiatkowski won stage 13. 

The Vingegaard-Pogačar battle takes centre stage on episode six as the Dane dominates the time trial and then Pogačar cracks.

The episode covers the suspicions created by Vingegaard’s performance and reveals how team manager Richard Plugge accused Groupama-FDJ of drinking beers on the rest day as a dead cat distraction to take the media spotlight and pressure off Vingegaard.

Patrick Lefevere and his spats with Julian Alaphilippe about his salary and poor results fill episode seven. The French rider jokes that he is paid “a bit too much for Patrick….” but went on the attack on seven stages to try to win a stage. Kasper Asgreen eventually saves the team’s Tour de France.

Marc Madiot responds to Plugge’s beer accusations during episode eight, which also recalls Pinot’s ‘Last Dance’ solo attack on his home roads during stage 20. The Virage Pinot was packed with screaming fans but following a perfect Netflix script, Pinot did not win the stage.

Episode eight and the second series of Tour de France: Unchained ends in Paris with the Champs Elysees sprint, the final podium and Vingegaard’s second victory ahead of Pogačar.

In the final moments, Madiot raises a sarcastic glass of beer as Pinot ends his Tour de France career, emotional but happy that it is all over. 

It leaves us wishing for more. Fortunately, the start of the 2024 Tour de France is only a few weeks away.