By Shane Stokes
Nicolas Roche has always had a certain amount of glitz about him – a famous Tour-winning father, a striking-looking French mother, a love of fashion and fancy cars. But his latest project - one of several new ones he has spoken to stickybottle about - still came as a surprise to many.
On Sunday it was announced that Roche will take part in RTE’s Dancing With The Stars, a celebrity-led programme which will be screened on national TV from January.
News of Roche’s participation came just over two months after he announced his retirement from professional cycling and, as he tells Stickybottle, it is something he considers as the perfect project as he seeks to evolve from his previous sport-centred self.
“There’s no turning back now,” Roche joked on Sunday, speaking shortly after the announcement of his participation. “I’m very excited. This is something that is really, really, really going to push my limits in many ways.”
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Roche had a very successful pro career, competing for 17 seasons and taking some very important results in that time. Those included two stage wins in the Vuelta a España plus placings of fifth and sixth overall. He was also 12th in the 2012 Tour de France, runner-up on several Tour stages, multiple national champion and a winner of the Route du Sud plus a stage in the Tour of Beijing.
His 17 seasons as a pro rider means his whole identity has been built around being an athlete but, at 37 years of age, he feels it is time to expand his horizons. He aims to remain fit and to have a role in the cycling world, but is also looking outside it.
“I got contacted by Sports Endorse, an Irish company,” he told Stickybottle. “They got in touch and asked me if I was interested in being part of the show. I said, ‘give me a couple of hours to think about it.’ Straight away I said to myself, ‘alright, this is something that is really, really going to change me again.’ I felt that it was just going to be something extremely challenging.
“I think that after my career, I needed something to focus on. This was the perfect scenario."
Roche has already expressed an interest in television, saying that he greatly enjoyed stints of commentary work with Eurosport and hoped to do more. Does he feel doing Dancing With The Stars will also help with his TV goals?
“Well, in terms of visibility it is great,” he answered. “It will kind of unite me with a more broader public in Ireland, not just cycling fans.”
The programme follows a similar formula to shows of the same name overseas, as well as Britain’s Simply Come Dancing. It pairs well-known people with professional dancers who will work closely with them to try to help them improve as much as possible. Couples are eliminated weekly and, ultimately, there will be one winning pair.
Other contestants include the author Cathy Kelly, the comedian Neil Delamere, the Paralympic gold medallist Ellen Keane, TV presenters Aengus Mac Grianna and Gráinne Seoige, the jockey Nina Carberry, rugby player Jordan Conroy, musicians Erica Cody and Billy McGuinness, Love Island contestant Matthew MacNabb plus the model Missy Keating, daughter of Ronan Keating.
Roche is clear he's no dancer
“I don’t go to nightclubs,” he said, laughing. “For me, my dancing skills were at a friend’s wedding or birthday parties or alone in my sitting room, but that’s only when I’m hoovering [laughs]. Dancing is something that I was ashamed of as a kid, so I never, ever danced.
“Growing up, when you go to friends parties, or to weddings, you dance because you always feel that you should…I was taught that the friends in the wedding are the ones that make the atmosphere when the family wants to sit down [laughs]. So I was committed to…I can’t say dancing, but to moving at a friend’s birthday parties, just because I always thought that it was the friends that had to continue encouraging people to go and dance. But that was about it…”
He and the other contestants will have the help of their professional dance partners, who will [ideally] help them all transform over the weeks into people who are much more competent. That’s been done with mixed success in the past—the show has been renowned for including some celebrities who really looked out of place—but Roche is already working hard with his partner and wants to do as well as he can.
“There’s a lot to it. Playing a character, trying to get into whatever the dance is. It is much more than just learning the steps. It’s learning to really, really let go of any type of boundaries or limits that you can have, even personality-wise.”
Today I don't have the confidence yet
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Roche’s reinvention of himself isn’t just limited to the dancefloor. His life has already been moving in diverse directions since he retired, with a holiday in Dubai being followed by a flurry of activity. He and his business partner Thomas Cahill opened a Roca Sports store in Cork and have plans for further outlets; he also spent time in England recently, helping a friend of his set up a fitness outlet called Athletic Gym.
“I was in London helping out a friend of mine with a gym project. I’ve invested with him in that. We were doing it on a budget, so I volunteered to do the filming for the videos. I was two weeks there doing that, recording over 700 of those. I’ve been doing bits and pieces with the official opening of the bike shop in Cork, and now I’ve been training and getting a few dance lessons before the show starts.”
Roche is determined to remain fit, knowing that a lot of bike riders let the routine slip and end up with poor physical and mental health as a result. His time has been tight but he’s been able to fit exercise in.
“When I was in the UK, I was in the gym a couple of hours a day. I haven’t been cycling much…well, two to three times a week, but not as much as I wanted. And I do running two times a week.
“I did get in a five hour ride in Wicklow. I just felt so good. I hope that when things settle down I will have a bit more time to go back on the bike. I have some projects during the year…I want to ride some gravel races, I want to do a lot of stuff. So I’m looking forward to getting stuck into it in the spring.”
One of his bike-related roles in 2022 will be working alongside his agent Andrew McQuaid at Trinity Sports. Roche revealed that he will be working with the mountain bike team.
“I’m really excited about that. That will be something very different. I can’t wait. I think the first race will be somewhere in April, and I’m really looking forward to discovering again, a new world, but with a link to cycling this time.
“You don’t have sports directors in mountain bike teams, so it’s kind of looking after the team, basically. It’s about making sure the training is done, dealing with the logistics, making sure the staff is there, looking after the travel arrangements. I think it will be general management stuff. But I’m quite not sure yet.”
That role will keep him directly in touch with the cycling world. He’s still adapting to no longer being a pro bike rider and so being around those who are still competing should help. Still, there is an adjustment period he is going through.
“This week is really the first week where, when I’m Instagram I’m starting to see posts of my friends in the cycling world all in training camps. It feels a bit strange, because it’s the first time like this… The other day, I was like, ‘oh, this year is the first year in a long time I’m not going to put up a sunrise from Calpe,’ for example.
“Last year, I think every professional posted about the sunrise in Calpe because it is absolutely spectacular. So this year there is no morning pre-six hour training posts. But that’s okay. Like I said, I’ve been busy, I’ve lived a lot of experiences already since I’ve retired. And it’s just a part of life now that the chapter is closed. I don’t have any regrets.”
What’s important is that he has retained his love of the sport. He didn’t stay so long that he retired tired and jaded, and clearly enjoys getting out training when he can. “I still love the bike. I still want to do bits and pieces next year. I will do some Gran Fondos, some gravel rides, but that’s very different to preparing a season.
“Thinking about it now, when it rains, for example, I’m like, ‘I’m happy I’m not out training today.’ Last week, during Storm Barra, I went for a run and I was happy with that.”
Still, he doesn’t plan on getting too comfortable. He wants to keep extending himself, and that includes pushing his limits in the new show.
“My biggest fear is to get it wrong, to make a fool of myself and not be at least to the minimum standard. But I’m working so hard that I think I will be okay. But, you know, it is down to what happens on the day. It’s one thing going from training in the studio to being on camera and doing a performance. Because it’s not really dancing, you have to do performance.
“That’s the bit that I’m worried about, because today I don’t have that confidence yet. I’m working on it. When I dance, when I started doing the few steps here and there, I’m getting the steps better, but I still need to show them better. To have that confidence. And that’s very hard for me to put out yet.
“As the dance teacher told me, it doesn’t matter if the step is wrong, you just have to make them believe it is right [laughs]. So it is all that. Whereas at this moment when I’m in the first few classes and dancing, my face is just worried (laughs).”
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