Stockton-on-Tees - Stockton-on-Tees (ITT)



Today's Winner



Stage Results

1		Tony Martin	Lotto - Soudal	55'14
2		David Millar	HTC - Highroad	+ 7
3		Marco Pinotti	Team Sky	+ 1'23
4		Fabian Cancellara	Cannondale - Drapac	+ 1'52
5		Chris Froome	Lampre - Merida	+ 1'53
6		Vasil Kiryienka	IAM Cycling	+ 1'54
7		Peter Velits	Discovery Channel	+ 1'56
8		Jérôme Coppel	Etixx - Quick·Step	s.t.
9		Jean-Christophe Peraud	Discovery Channel	s.t.
10		Xavi Tondo	Lampre - Merida	+ 1'59

Another TT win from the German machine.

The top two were in a class of there own

Favorites:

- Mark Renshaw (BMC Racing Team)
- Michael Matthews (Cannondale -Drapac)
- Tyler Farrar (Tinkoff)
- Matthew Goss (Movistar Team)

Other riders with a shot at the podium are Chris Sutton (Lotto - Soudal), Jose Serpa (Ag2r - La Mondiale), Peter Stetina (BMC Racing Team), Simon Gerrans and Tejay van Garderen (Trek - Segafredo) and Maxim Iglinskiy (Team Sky).

Previous winners

	First	Second	Third
2015	Andrew Talansky	Cadel Evans	Peter Stetina
2016	Michael Matthews	Cadel Evans	Peter Stetina

Startlist


Route Preview

My money is on Farrar

Westville - Westville



Today's Winner



Stage Results

1		Levi Leipheimer	Trek - Segafredo	4h27'06
2		Rigoberto Urán	Vacansoleil - DCM	+ 8
3		Mark Renshaw	BMC Racing Team	+ 8'43
4		Matthew Goss	Movistar Team	+ 8'51
5		Tyler Farrar	Tinkoff	s.t.
6		Michael Matthews	Cannondale - Drapac	s.t.
7		Christopher Sutton	Lotto - Soudal	s.t.
8		Peter Stetina	BMC Racing Team	s.t.
9		Rohan Dennis	Lotto - Soudal	s.t.
10		José Serpa	AG2R La Mondiale	s.t.

Trek - nice !

Favorites:

- Lloyd Mondory (Etixx - Quickstep)
- Andre Greipel (Lotto - Soudal)
- Kenny van Hummel (LottoNL - Jumbo)
- Marcel Kittel (Astana Pro Team)

Other riders with a shot at the podium are Alexander Kristoff and Elia Viviani (Euskaltel - Euskadi), Ben Swift (Vacansoleil - DMC), Nacer Bouhanni (Ag2r - La Mondiale), Simone Ponzi (LottoNL - Jumbo) and Mark Cavendish (IAM Cycling).

Previous winners

	First	Second	Third
2015	Jose Joaquin Rojas	Bjorn Leukemans	Elia Viviani
2016	Andre Greipel	Jose Joaquin Rojas	Ben Swift

Startlist


Route Preview

Stockton-on-Tees - Stockton-on-Tees



Today's Winner



Stage Results

1		Lloyd Mondory	Etixx - Quick·Step	4h59'15
2		André Greipel	Lotto - Soudal	s.t.
3		Francisco José Ventoso	Movistar Team	s.t.
4		Nacer Bouhanni	AG2R La Mondiale	s.t.
5		Ben Swift	Vacansoleil - DCM	s.t.
6		Tony Gallopin	IAM Cycling	s.t.
7		Mark Cavendish	IAM Cycling	s.t.
8		Kenny Van Hummel	Team LottoNL - Jumbo	s.t.
9		José Joaquín Rojas	Movistar Team	s.t.
10		Francesco Gavazzi	Lampre - Merida	s.t.

UCI World Tour rankings riders (after National Championships)

1		Lloyd Mondory	Etixx	454.4
2		Jelle Vanendert	Lotto	370.65
3		David Lopez	Euskaltel	341.56
4		Alexander Kristoff	Euskaltel	310.37
5		Björn Leukemans	Lotto	239.25
6		Fränk Schleck	Etixx	214.19
7		Hubert Dupont	Euskaltel	207.54
8		Emanuele Sella	Movistar	202.05
9		Chris Froome	Lampre	190.07
10		Cadel Evans	Lotto	181.15
11		Jerome Coppel	Etixx	164.69
12		Tony Martin	Lotto	161.41
13		Andre Greipel	Lotto	155.15
14		Robert Gesink	Ag2r	152.83
15		Andrew Talansky	HTC	144.58

UCI World Tour rankings teams (after National Championships)

1		Lotto - Soudal	1159.5
2		Euskaltel - Euskadi	1009.5
3		Etixx - Quickstep	878.35
4		HTC - Highroad	528.95
5		Ag2r - La Mondiale	455.35
6		Cannondale - Drapac	355.2
7		Team Katusha	351.15
8		Team Sky	322.9
9		Movistar Team	306.35
10		Trek - Segafredo	298.3
11		Lampre - Merida	282.3
12		Team LottoNL - Jumbo	276
13		Astana Pro Team	265.35
14		Discovery Channel	248.5
15		Vacansoleil - DMC	248.2
16		BMC Racing Team	193.9
17		IAM Cycling	185.2
18		Tinkoff	161.95

UCI Pro Continental rankings riders (after National Championships)

1		Joost Van Leijen	Giant	209.55
2		Gregory Rast	Orica	70
3		Sylvain Chavanel	Giant	22.75
4		Wilco Kelderman	Giant	11.1
5		Thomas Voeckler	Dimension Data	5
6		Alejandro Valverde	Cofidis	5
7		Jonas van Genechten	Giant	3.85
8		John Gadret	FDJ	3.85
9		Bryan Coquard	Dimension Data	2.75
10		Michal Kwiatkowski	FDJ	1.65
11		Daryl Impey	Dimension Data	1.1
12		Cyril Gautier	FDJ	1
13		Julian Arredondo	Orica	0.55

UCI Pro Continental rankings teams (after National Championships)

1		Team Giant - Alpecin	247.25
2		Orica - BikeExchange	70.55
3		Dimension Data	8.85
4		FDJ	6.5
5		Cofidis, Solutions Credits	5

Mondory is having a great year, a teammate Frank (my hero in this story ) doing fairly well too.

Not bad having three riders in the first seven but now its time for Euskaltel to make there move

Shame Frank Schleck is not riding the Tour, which is the next race. On Euskaltel it will be Dupont fighting for the podium and Kristoff for the stages.

Apologies for the break in the story, normal service will resume shortly.

One more year the World of cycling is paralysed for its most important race, the Tour de France. A peloton of 198 riders will travel through France, starting in the Belgian town of Liege this season. The route will be the same that crowned Tejay van Garderen 3 years ago, with a significant weight of time trials. There will be 2 long and flat tests against the clock, finishing in Besancon and Chartres, which will tilt the balance towards the time trialists compared to other Grand Tour routes in modern cycling. Among the stages in the mountains, the most significant ones will be those finishing at La Toussuire in the Alps and Peyragudes in the Pyrenees.

In terms of the startlist, there are a few important riders missing who probably thought that the long time trials do not suit them. Among those we can find David Lopez, Jelle Vanendert and Frank Schleck. It is most understandable for Vanendert, who also concentrates in classics and has a more natural stage racer in Cadel Evans at the team. Nevertheless, the names at the start are really strong with the riders in the podiums of 2014 and 2015 all at the race. It is worth noting that no rider has been able to win the Tour twice yet with Bauke Mollema and Hubert Dupont coming closest to achieving that feature.

Favorites:

- Cadel Evans (Lotto - Soudal): Cadel Evans has been steadily progressing in his career and he has reached a point when he can be a candidate for the Tour de France. He was in the podium a couple of years ago but he has made much progress since then. The route should also be quite favorable for him with many time trial kilometers. Nevertheless, Evans has never won a stage race in his whole career so it might be a long shot for the Tour de France to be the first. The fact that he has the Lotto - Soudal team with him should be very good news to him.
- Laurens Ten Dam (Cannondale - Drapac): Laurens Ten Dam is the current winner of both the Tour de France and the Giro d'Italia, so it would be quite strange not to have him among the favorites. He is probably the rider that will be most closely monitored by his rivals during the next 3 weeks. However, his season will not give him a lot of confidence. He suffered crashes early in the season wherever he went and his only decent result was a 5th place at the Tour de Suisse. It is not a bad sign if you consider that many of the riders ahead were targeting the race and skipping the Tour.
- Jean-Christophe Peraud (Discovery Channel): Peraud is one of the riders most benefited by a race that combines the mountains with long and flat time trials. The French will be delighted that it is the Tour de France, his home race, has a route with those characteristics. It would not be a new feeling for him to be in the podium of a Grand Tour as he was third in the Vuelta a España in 2010. However, he does not have results that good this season as he could only be 5th in both the Pais Vasco and the Dauphine. On the other hand, he will not have such a good support from his team as Discovery is no longer a powerhouse in the World Tour.
- Marco Pinotti (Team Sky): Pinotti is another rider that is better against the clock than in the mountains so this Tour is also a good chance for him to have a shot at the podium. However, his only podium in a stage race was in the 2016 Tour de Romandie. He has not been inspiring in his first season as a rider of Team Sky and the 5th position in the Tirreno - Adriatico has been his best result of the season. Additionally, his support in the mountains will not be good at all as Mauro Santambrogio and Bradley Wiggins should be his best helpers.

Other riders with a shot at the podium are Robert Gesink (Ag2r - La Mondiale), Jerome Coppel (Etixx - Quickstep), Chris Froome (Lampre - Merida), Bauke Mollema (Vacansoleil - DMC), Mathias Frank (IAM Cycling) and Tejay van Garderen (Trek - Segafredo).

Among the sprinters, we can find some of the best in the World, like Lloyd Mondory (Etixx - Quickstep), Andre Greipel (Lotto - Soudal), Mark Renshaw (BMC Racing Team), Kenny van Hummel (LottoNL - Jumbo), Marcel Kittel (Astana Pro Team) and Alexander Kristoff (Euskaltel - Euskadi).

Previous winners

	First	Second	Third
2009	Hubert Dupont	Janez Brajkovic	Rigoberto Uran
2012	Bauke Mollema	Mikel Nieve	Hubert Dupont
2014	Tejay Van Garderen	Bauke Mollema	Matthias Frank
2015	Laurens Ten Dam	Hubert Dupont	Cadel Evans

Startlist


Route Preview

I'm looking forward to this. The flat 52 km ITT on stage 20 should make the pure climbers push hard in the mountains to have any chance of a good result.

GO CADEL!

With no Frank my applause(s) goes to Cannondale
Mondory in the sprint

The Tour de France should be a nice time for Euskaltel to shine !!!

I can't remember having that much expectation for a race in this story before

Stage 1: Liege - Liege (ITT)



The Tour de France starts in Liege with a 6 kilometers long prologue that should not make significant gaps in the GC but that will hurt the chances of some of the sprinters to take the yellow jersey in one of the upcoming stages. The route itself is completely flat so the favorites will be the time trialists and those that are specialists in prologues. This is only the first of a couple of stages in Belgium, which make for the Grand Depart of the 2017 Tour de France, none of them suitable for the sprinters to take the win before hitting France.



The first of the candidates for the win in the prologue was Cameron Meyer (Trek), the time trial World Champion. Meyer took the win in the National Championship again last week but that has been his only win of the season so far, which is not such a good sign for him. The early pace today had been set by Andrew Talansky (HTC), so it was already a good benchmark for Meyer. The Australian easily took the first place provisionally by cutting 6 seconds off his time, which is a significant gap in a 6 kilometers long time trial.



Tony Martin (Lotto) has been the best rider against the clock in the season so far, with wins twice in the Tour de Romandie, the time trial of the Criterium du Dauphine and the National Championship. Today he was outstanding again and he managed to beat Cameron Meyer's best time by a margin of 3 seconds. It may not look like a big gap but the fact that he beat Meyer again must be hard psychologically for the Australian. It is worth noting how good the season for Martin has been so far and how much he has improved in the last few seasons.



Jerome Coppel (Etixx) started his run much later than Tony Martin. He is one of the local hopes for the GC alongside Hubert Dupont (Euskaltel). His prologue performance was really good and at some point he looked like beating Martin but in the end he could only take the provisional 2nd position, losing only on the hundredths of a second against the German. Coppel had already won the time trial at the Vuelta al Pais Vasco this season and even though he is missing a really good result like the podium in the Dauphine last season his performances with Etixx have been really good and consistent.



Another of the French riders that could do well in the Tour de France is Jean-Christophe Peraud (Discovery). He is quite a good time trialist, as he proved a couple of seasons ago by taking the win in the European Championship. His start of the Tour was really good and he also narrowly missed on the provisional best time held by Tony Martin. He took the third position but also within less than a second off Martin's time. This was a proof of how close the top riders are matched in such a short time trial as the top 3 was within less than a second at that stage.



Tejay van Garderen (Trek) has a target of adding second win in the Tour de France this season and he will need to put the foundations of that win on the time trials. However, he has not been historically as good in prologues as in longer time trials. Nevertheless, he took the 5th provisional time as he crossed the finish line, which is a good result for him. He lost 7 seconds to Tony Martin but put a few seconds on most of the strongest climbers in the race. Tejay has had a few good performances this season but he has lacked consistency and his only podium so far was in the Tirreno - Adriatico.



There are also sprinters that are specialists in prologues but most of them started very late in the day and the rain had started to fall in Liege. The first of those was Tyler Farrar (Tinkoff). The American sprinter is not the dominant rider that he used to be a few years ago but he already took two wins at the start of the season, proving that he can still be a factor. Today he kept his options of getting the leader's jersey eventually by taking the 9th provisional time, 10 seconds behind Tony Martin. Tinkoff is in dire need of results and Farrar is a rider that can get them.



Alexander Kristoff (Euskaltel) is a very versatile rider that may not take that many wins in straight-forward sprints but will be incredibly effective as soon as there is any difficulty along the route. Most notably, he won the Paris - Nice and the Milano - Sanremo in quick succession. His time in today's time trial was similar to the one recorded by Tyler Farrar, although he took the 10th provisional time on the hundredths of a second. Kristoff is quite capable of getting a good result in tomorrow's difficult stage so he is a rider to be considered.



The last of the riders with a shot at the final win in the prologue was Marcel Kittel (Astana). The German is a rider that has promised a lot in the last few seasons but that has regularly left a bitter-sweet taste among his fans. He is yet to win this season but took a total of 15 wins during the last 3 seasons, which is not within the reach of many riders. However, today was not the day when he would take a win as he had to settle for the 5th position, only 5 seconds behind Tony Martin. If Kittel is able to survive tomorrow's finish in Seraing he could well aim for the yellow jersey in the first week.

The gaps were not too big in this prologue but it is worth mentioning how some of the favorites that were outside the top 10 fared: Marco Pinotti (Sky) +13''; Chris Froome (Lampre) and Bauke Mollema (Vacansoleil) +14''; Robert Gesink (Ag2r) +18''; Cadel Evans (Lotto) and Mathias Frank (IAM) +20''; Laurens Ten Dam (Cannondale) +21''. Tomorrow's stage will be quite different and it will not be one for the pure sprinters as the route will finish at Seraing after a gentle climb during the last 3 kilometers of the stage. There should not be big gaps either.

Today's Winner



Stage Results

1		Tony Martin	Lotto - Soudal	7'45
2		Jérôme Coppel	Etixx - Quick·Step	s.t.
3		Jean-Christophe Peraud	Discovery Channel	s.t.
4		Cameron Meyer	Trek - Segafredo	+ 3
5		Marcel Kittel	Astana Pro Team	+ 5
6		Tejay Van Garderen	Trek - Segafredo	+ 7
7		Andrew Talansky	HTC - Highroad	+ 9
8		Wilco Kelderman	Team Giant - Alpecin	+ 10
9		Jonathan Castroviejo	Lampre - Merida	s.t.
10		Tyler Farrar	Tinkoff	s.t.

Points

1		Tony Martin	Lotto - Soudal	20
2		Jérôme Coppel	Etixx - Quick·Step	17
3		Jean-Christophe Peraud	Discovery Channel	15
4		Cameron Meyer	Trek - Segafredo	13
5		Marcel Kittel	Astana Pro Team	11

Young

1		Rohan Dennis	Lotto - Soudal	7'56
2		Tom Dumoulin	Cannondale - Drapac	+ 1
3		Adriano Malori	Trek - Segafredo	+ 3
4		Tanel Kangert	Team Katusha	+ 5
5		Ruben Plaza	BMC Racing Team	+ 8

Teams

1		Trek - Segafredo	23'38
2		Etixx - Quick·Step	+ 7
3		Lotto - Soudal	+ 8
4		Discovery Channel	+ 11
5		Tinkoff	+ 16