Welcome to Qatar! Quite some strong time trialists have come here, hoping to be victorious on the first stage. Let’s not waste too much time and dive right into the action.
Turek is the first rider to start and he’s not a too terrible prologue rider. 6’47” is his time.
But wildcard rider Viennet is clearly on another level. Or wait.. He is not able to take over the lead! 6’53” means he is currently second, with Turek six seconds faster!
Zakarin on the other hand is able to set a new best time. 6’46” means he is one second faster than the previous best time from the Moser rider.
Van Niekerk and Wohler finish around six seconds slower, but Tanfield comes very close! He is a fraction of a second too slow though, and is currently second.
Würtz is always an interesting rider to follow in a time trial. Prologues are not entirely his thing, but he still sets the new best time! 6’42” for the Grieg rider.
Greek time trial champion Vlatos on the road now. He’s good, but not good enough. 6’43” means he is one second slower than Würtz and currently second.
Sütterlin disappoints with 6’52”, 10 seconds slower than the best time and only just in the top-8 so far.
Another national time trial champion on the road now. Yatsevich is also unable to improve the best time as he finishes six seconds slower and has a provisional seventh place.
Prologue specialist Schomber shows that he is actually capable of something! He finishes in 6’40” and has the new best time!
Leung with a very bad day. The Hong Kong rider from King Power finishes almost 15” slower than Schomber.
Ghyselinck surprised everyone with a provisional fourth place at five seconds of the best time, while all the Qatarese cameras were focused on Paillot. The Frenchman overtakes the Belgian’s fourth place, as he is one second faster. Four seconds too slow for the best time though.
Whereas the other Hong Kong prologue specialist was quite disappointing, Kwok is performing very strong! Second place for the Polar rider so far, only one second slower than Schomber’s time!
More than 100 rider have come in, which means there are around 70 to go. Jallays has just surprised us with a very good time to be fourth at the moment.
Kung now taking over that fourth place. The Swiss is 2” slower than Schomber.
It has started raining, and that might have made a big difference in Chavanne’s final result. The Evonik rider has to be content with a seventh place so far, at three seconds of the best time.
And yet another rider finishing so close yet so far away. Dal Col now fourth at two seconds of the best time.
Ioannidis reminding his manager who the best Greek time trialist is! He finishes second, only Schomber ahead of him! One second too slow!
A good prologue mixed with a decent sprint is always a recipe for success in prologues! Aregger overtakes the second place now, but the Puma rider is also a second too slow! Schomber still in the lead, can he hold his position with guys like Kemboi and Coquard coming soon?!
Andersen inside the final km now … And he annihilates the opposition! He finishes with a time of 6’31”, almost ten seconds faster than anyone else! 29 riders to come!
The Festina riders seem to be feeling good! Farantakis finishes third, nine seconds slower than the best time. It’s looking promising for his leader.
Before the sprinters come, we see one more time trialist. Ganna barely misses out on the best time! He moves into second, only one second slower than Andersen!
The top sprinters are not doing too well so far, and neither is Kenyan champion Kemboi. A sixteenth place at 13” of the best time is the best he could do.
Coquard is the last rider to start, but does not impress, just like the other sprinters near the end. Changing weather conditions? He finishes 51st at 23”.
