I think it was 1 minute up on the yellow jersey who was at the back of the peloton

Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. Shame for Stuyven but still a great finish.

it was an odd finish, Sagan was a sitting duck out front but the lad went too early you can see why he was upset with himself!

Sagan’s just been saying that he thought it way the sprint for third place so he waited for someone else to go!

Out in Japan, so dint see it. What caused the big time splits on a straightforward day?

Contador went down again and wasn’t looking comfortable, Porte had a puncture at 5km out and had to wait for neutral service

Tough 3km climb at the end. Contador crashed early on, couldn’t stay with the main group on the climb, Porte punctured a few km (4?) out and didn’t get back on.

Froome, Quintana, Aru, Rolland, Van Garderen all still on the same time. Nibali and Pinot lost a bit.

Ok, so Porte, Contador struggling already, and if Nibali/Pinot can’t keep up on that finish they look in trouble too. Surprised Cav so far back – was he caught the wrong side of a crash?

No Cav just struggled on the rolling finish, 14% at one point and they weren’t hanging around, the last guy in the break was caught with 500ish metres to go so the last 10km were very quick

Cav and his team where riding decently, front of the peloton for a long while. As above he onlynreally dropped back on the climb to the finish when they cranked it up to catch the breakaway. The early part of the race 90 mins (?) was in pretty dire weather, a few crashes.

They were still catching a break at the very last minute, so fast finish. Hence Porte, Cav, etc were completely screwed. Decent amount of climbing on it.

Prudomme plays another blinder to design a course to get Sagan in yellow. And the nice sideline that Cav also gets his long deserved yellow jersey too.

Porte and Bertie are finished. That wheel change was a shocker. I always face backwards to change a back wheel so I can lever back the RD.

Cheers for the inner ring link @mikewsmith…