Key events
168km to go: The breakaway group is officially on the climb, the two in pursuit are plugging away and now just 40 seconds behind.
171km to go: Uno-X Mobility and Lidl-Trek have sent a couple of ‘poursuiavnts’ up the road to bridge the gap to the breakaway. Jonas Abrahamsen has cut the gap to under a minute, Ryan Gibbons of Lidl-Trek is just sitting on the Uno-X man’s wheel.
Richard Cutler emails in with a prediction:
Really, I’ve no idea, but someone in my Velogames group reckons Mathieu van der Poel will do it today, and maybe hold on to yellow for a week. Me, I’ve got 10p on Giulio Ciccone at 35/1, for no reason other than I read somewhere that someone reckoned he’d win today.
As I say, I’ve no idea, but I’ll buy myself a large 99 flake later if it comes in!
William Fotheringham tipped Ciccone in his preview, so not a terrible shout. Not getting much change on a large 99 with a flake from those returns these days.
188km to go: We have a breakaway, at last. Sandy Dujardin, Mateo Vercher (TotalEnergies), Frank Van Den Broek (DSM-Firmenich PostNL), Clement Champoussin (Arkea-B&B), Ion Izagirre (Cofidis), Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ), and Matej Mohoric (Bahrain Victorious). Uno-X Mobility have missed this and are desperately chasing but to little avail so far.
192km to go: We have another group try to go away, Warren Barguil and Simon Geschke have been busy in the early stages but they are surely way too talented to be allowed in the breakaway.
194km to go: Still no break and David Miller reckons it won’t happen now until we hit the first climb at around 176km to go when the peloton ascends Col de Valico tre Faggi.
201km to go: A large group has formed at the front but that looks way too big to be allowed to go away.
205km to go: And we’re off, the flag has dropped and Tour de France 2024 is underway proper.
Please hit me with your predictions via email. For what it’s worth, I’m backing Tom Pidcock to cause a suprise today. Coming in off a good week on the mountain bike, a punchy stage with a couple of category two climbs.
Close to kilometre zero now, who will look to punch away early doors?
The Tour de France but make it Italy. Florence, setting off from Piazza della Signoria, riders rolling across Le Ponte Vecchio, they’ve done the full Italian job on this. The riders are still on the rollout and have about 8km to the flag drop.
Here’s a look at today’s stage, Saturday 29 June: Florence to Rimini, 206km, with William Fotheringham’s preview.
A first Grand Départ in Italy, ironically when cycling talent in this traditional heartland is vanishingly scarce. There will be barely any Italians on the start list and there is zero prospect of a repeat of Italy’s last overall win, Vincenzo Nibali in 2014. A dramatically hard opening stage is suited to the punchy talent of Giulio Ciccone; however, with three second category climbs, who would bet against Tadej Pogacar trying to gain an early advantage?
📈 7 ascensions au programme aujourd’hui, pour 3 600m de D+ 🥵
🧮 Un maximum de 23 points à prendre aujourd’hui. Qui voyez-vous endosser le maillot à pois ce soir ? ⚪️🔴#TDF2024 pic.twitter.com/R1mYsUzf2G
— Maillot à Pois E.Leclerc (@maillotapois) June 29, 2024
Preamble
We are soon to be away in Firenze, and we’ve been loading up on previews all week.
Where else to start than Cav?
This weekend will see a true great, for all his flaws, remembered.
The contenders to be in the yellow jersey in Paris.
Here’s your team-by-team guide.
And, of course, stage by stage.