<\/p>\n
After a deep trawl through the current peloton, this is the only eight-man squad Santa could realistically put together without forcing it.<\/p>\n
The undisputed leader. Big engine, explosive moments, and the name alone makes him first pick for the red-and-white jersey.<\/p>\n
Every Christmas needs a bit of jingle, and Jinglegaard brings calm authority when the sleigh heads uphill.<\/p>\n
A Christmas Tour team without Chris-mas Froome would feel wrong. Experience, patience, and plenty of stories for a long December evening.<\/p>\n
Yule is right there in the name, and so is youthful energy. Santa\u2019s future-proof option for the mountains.<\/p>\n
Someone has to deliver, and Present-son does exactly that. Reliable, powerful, and always on time.<\/p>\n
Built for cold conditions and crosswinds. If the Tour ever detours through Lapland, Snow-ren is ready.<\/p>\n
Merry by name and ruthless at the finish. Santa still needs stages wrapped up quickly.<\/p>\n
Cold weather specialist and final piece of the puzzle. When the temperature drops, Frost thrives.<\/p>\n
It may not trouble the yellow jersey contenders, but as Christmas Day teams go, the North Pole could do far worse. And unlike Santa\u2019s sleigh, this one would definitely pass a bike check.<\/p>\n
Of course, none of this is meant to be taken too seriously. Christmas Day is one of the few moments in the season when cycling can afford to relax, have a bit of fun, and look at the peloton from a different angle. If nothing else, it is a reminder that even in a sport driven by marginal gains and data, there is still room for a smile before the road tilts uphill again in January.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After a deep trawl through the current peloton, this is the only eight-man squad Santa could realistically…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":290124,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,75016,784,6495,171886,63568,77973,199357,85,172711,201104],"class_list":{"0":"post-371757","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-chris-froome","11":"tag-cycling","12":"tag-jonas-vingegaard","13":"tag-juan-ayuso","14":"tag-mads-pedersen","15":"tag-mathieu-van-der-poel","16":"tag-soren-kragh-andersen","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-tim-merlier","19":"tag-tobias-foss"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/290124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}