Well, well, well, who would have predicted that as a start.

Off to Belgium today:

Liège in cycling means a lot of hills before coming to town as Liège-Bastogne-Liège is one of the hardest race on the international calendar but stage 2 is dedicated to the sprinters. Only two category 4 climbs are on the map: Grafenberg after only 6.5km and the côte d’Olne 20.5km before the end. There’s something unprecedented on the route: 35 kilometres after leaving Düsseldorf, the riders will come back to the starting town after a visit to the Neanderthal man at the prehistoric site of the Neander valley. Geraint Thomas will enjoy his first day ever in the yellow jersey ten years after he made his debut at the Tour de France in London. Moreover, Team Sky will savor their domination on stage 1 as they placed four riders in the top 8 of a Tour de France stage for the first time since the foundation of the team in 2010.

Not entirely flat:

Who’s in the mix, off the Inrng we go

The Contenders: the wide flat roads and the lack of any sharp corners means a dragstrip finish to suit the powerful sprinters. Marcel Kittel is the prime pick, he’s in form as we saw in the Ster ZLM Tour and comes with strong lead out and the whole Quick Step team will be delighted to take a win on home soil. If the wind is up the team will be even more at home too.

Arnaud Démare is a less convincing pick, he has beaten the best sprinters but not regularly. Still the finish suits his sprinting style, the big roads allow his FDJ sprint train to drop him into position. Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) is the other pick suited to this kind of finish, like Démare he can hit the front early and nobody can come past.

Three riders suited to the finish but it’s a sprint rather than a team time trial so we’ll see plenty of other names in the mix. Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) will be there. André Greipel (Lotto-Soudal) says he’s in “really good form” so we’ll see if he can deliver a home win for his squad. Nacer Bouhanni (Cofidis) should be in the mix, ditto John Degenkolb (Trek-Segafredo). Dylan Groenewegen (Lotto-Soudal) has a crash yesterday but slid along rather than slammed into the tarmac so he should be ok. Michael Matthews (Team Sunweb) won a stage of the Tour de Suisse recently and watch if Nikias Arndt can drop him off again with another perfect lead out. Write off Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data) at your peril but he’s short of form and if he’s going to get a stage win it could be later in the race so will he be the team’s protected sprinter or does Edvald Boasson Hagen get in the mix?

Next there’s a wave of outsiders like Dan McLay (Fortuneo-Oscaro), Adrien Petit and Thomas Boudat (Direct Energie), Sonny Colbrelli (Bahrain-Merida) but getting past the big names cited above is a big ask.

And a look back to yesterday, you can only really focus on 1 team, love them or hate them, Sky smashed it:
Kiri:

Froome dog:

And of course, G in yellow:

Sprinters stage so decent chance of G being in yellow again tomorrow I reckon.

Kittel / Greipel going to be keen. Be interesting to see if Cav is on the pace or not.

Weather at the finish ?

If it’s dry it’ll be a French Sprinter, if it’s wet I’d go Sagan.

Heading into Belgium will be great for the Northern Lads, wouldn’t count Greipel out nor… a breakaway ?!?!?! Phil Le Gil.

Can’t see the sprint teams cocking this one up. Sounds like a long straight run to the line too, has to be Kittel. Be interesting to see if Cav can get in the mix. Kittel for a short spell in green before handing it over to Sagan for the rest of the race. Chaos for the last 20k 🙂

Ohh, 11 crashes and #nodiscs

#nodiscs

Are disc brake bikes immune to crashing? 😉

Just for bikebouy… 🙂

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/historic-first-a-double-disc-tour-de-france-time-trial-bike/

looking forward to watching the start of the race to see fighting for the break.

Other than that I’m doing a crosswinds dance.

First KOM points after 6.5km: should be a lively start to the day.

THanks Lunge for doing these it is very much appreciated

I am going for Cav for purely nostalgic reasons

Be interesting to see if Cav is on the pace or not.

Given that he was almost caught on the line in yesterday’s TT, I suspect not. If he can stay with them though, he’s got to be one of the hungriest in there…

Be interesting to see if Cav can get in the mix.

His interview before the stage on Eurosport yesterday said he wasn’t holding out any hope for wins. #bluffing?

Be interesting to see if Cav can get in the mix.

I’d be very surprised if he gets top 10. For the moment I think Edvald B-H will be the team’s designated sprinter.
Can’t really see past Kittel and Greipel today though, both Quick-Step and Lotto-Soudal will be under sponsors orders.

Be interesting to see if Phillippe Gilbert fancies a crack on his home roads, maybe an opportunistic lone break attempt but I don’t think he could hold off the combined sprint trains of QS, LS and Dimension Data.

Personally, I’m looking forward to what the commentators have to talk about when they get to 113.5km in.

whatever you think of Sky you have to love Geraint.

Apparently he looked at the maps last night and then pronounced on the start line that it doesn’t seem very far from Dusseldorf to Paris and that he thinks they should head straight there instead of messing around going south 😮

Strangely, with Sky looking strong and a chunk of the other teams facing a 3 weeks slog with little prospect of anything other than a bit of time sweating in a breakaway, and of the Sky boys only Froome likely to complain about it, if there was a vote it could well be 1 against and about 200 for that amendment 😉

Just switched on around the 164k to go mark & could have sworn the camera zoomed in on a chrome painted Specialized bike which looked like it had discs – Am I seeing things?

Just switched on around the 164k to go mark & could have sworn the camera zoomed in on a chrome painted Specialized bike which looked like it had discs – Am I seeing things?

Marcel Kittel.
He often uses a disc braked bike. It’s the new Tarmac, just in custom paintjob for him.

Ahaa, cheers – wasn’t sure if anyone was using them in the tour, still not used to seeing them in the peloton *awaits flying limbs* 😆

Froomey doesn’t look very happy today 😀

well it seems that i can watch it in portuguese or french…..

i dont speak much portguese outside of good day how are you + workshop instructions and ordering food/beer so thats a non starter.

Guess my rusty french will be polished up in the coming weeks.

Froomey doesn’t look very happy today

You’ve seen the weather, yes?
😉

Froomey doesn’t look very happy today

Anyone who’s not Belgian looking happy with today’s conditions?

I imagine the Welsh continent aren’t too fussed..

You’ve seen the weather, yes?

it was before the rain, I think it was the “Whooot-tssh! Whooot-tssh! mush mush” from G that he didn’t like 😉

Has anything of interest happened in the last 60km?
Just turned it back on with 44km to go having watched the first hour or so.

Why are some of sky in black and others white?

Black rain capes

I’ve been watching Nino dominate on the Bike channel, now turned over to watch the sprint. Didn’t really want to sit in front of 100k of drudgery.

Froome and Bardet down, off the back but 30k to go

I was just wondering when the first big crash of the Tour was going to be…

Looks like G survived unscathed for once, Froome and Bardet seem to be the only big names brought down/delayed but all getting back on now.

Little bit of extra work and drama that they probably didn’t need right now.

Froome is calling for a bike with a power meter. Can’t cope without one 🙂

Kwiatkoski (sp) has a black short sleeved jersey on?

Froome is calling for a bike with a power meter. Can’t cope without one

Calling for one that fits, I imagine.

Froome is calling for a bike with a power meter. Can’t cope without one

Nah, just yet another Pinarello fallen to pieces!

Kwiatkoski (sp) has a black short sleeved jersey on?

I think it’s a waterproof jacket that has had the sleeves cut of it, Gabba style.
Rapha (when they took over for Sky) started producing them and the feature made it into their race cape range. There’s a seam-sealed area just above the elbow where you can cut the sleeves off without the jacket fraying. Several other companies followed with similar features, I’d imagine Castelli were told to do the same.

Little bit of extra work and drama that they probably didn’t need right now.

Doesn’t matter on this stage. He has the distance to get into the bunch inside the 3 minute mark and lose nothing to the GC.

There’s a seam-sealed area just above the elbow where you can cut the sleeves off without the jacket fraying.

just checked mine, so there is, never knew that was there, not that ill be cutting it up though

I’m rooting for Taylor Phinney now! I think it’s going to be one of those heartbreaking catches with 2-3km to go but he deserves the Combative Rider award if nothing else.

Phinney of old would be a good bet for this, be good to see him get one over the sprinters.