What really goes on inside a Tour de France bus during those closed-door meetings

DREUX, France — For the Tour de France cyclists, the team bus is a sanctuary. Outside their hotel rooms, it's the only place the riders can enjoy some semblance of privacy. There are no fans in their faces badgering them for selfies, no journalists peppering them with the same questions day after day.

For an hour or so before and after each stage, the athletes get to relax in the air-conditioned coaches, with their covered windows, reclining seats, Spotify playlists, TVs, showers, espresso machine, and refrigerators packed with fresh food and cold drinks. And no matter how sultry it is outside, inside it's always cool and dark.

But the bus is also a working office, and as in any job there's a time to get down to business, to talk strategy and how to get results. The 22 Tour teams show up to win, after all, be it individual stages or the race overall. And they do need results — their jobs and sponsorship depend on it.

Success in the world's biggest bike race often comes down to executing a winning plan, and it's on the bus that each day's plan is reviewed in detail, or redrawn depending on how the race unfolds. The American outfit EF Education First–Drapac p/b Cannondale invited Business Insider inside its team bus for one of its daily meetings.

Here's what we saw:

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As we've learned, the job of a professional bike racer is not unlike that of many other jobs. There are responsibilities, goals, challenges, opportunities, and even performance reviews (very public ones). They show up for work every day and are expected to perform their best. It's just that they get paid to ride bikes.

Each day of the three-week Tour, the riders wake up early and eat breakfast in their team hotel before boarding the bus and driving to the start. Once the bus is parked, the window blinds are pulled down, the music is turned off, the rider chatter stops, and the space becomes quiet, the only sound being that of the big motor humming in the belly of the bus and the AC blowing through the vents. EF-Drapac's head sports director, Charly Wegelius, stands at the front of the bus to begin the meeting. A former pro rider himself, Wegelius brings decades of experience to the team.

The meetings typically don't feature many slides, but the ones Wegelius does use help communicate visually what he believes is the important information to know. He lists in bullet points the "keys to the game" and goes over each. It helps the riders get their head in the race and prepared for what's to come.

The day we visited the bus was not a very complex stage, but on days in the mountains things do get more complicated in terms of planning and strategy.