Grassmarket

Richie Porte also caught.

Thomas de Gendt spots his chance, off on a long break. Everyone thought TdG was daft, but he’s holding it so far. Could well be daft, ofcourse. More action, Ineos attack. catch a few out! 32k to go. Pogačar & Landa seperated off the main group.

Trentin pushes Sagan into the barriers, gets the 20 points. Sagan 17 so back into maillot vert virtuel. Bora rock on, so they’re after the stage win as well.

The elastic has definitely snapped now, 52” to group 2. 2’28” to all the other sprinters.

Got our early break - Cosnefroy for the KoM points, & Schär, just saying hello. Schär gives up. Bora trying to do a job for Sagan, by pushing the sprinters out the back. Oh dear poor old Cosnefroy only just holds on for his two points. Bora got Bennett off the back though. They’ve got a couple more climbs to work with before the sprint. So looks like being a more unpredictable stage than we thought. Ooh! Crosswinds! Peleton is broken into four groups now, so some people are going to be in trouble. Sagan Gp1, Bennett Gp2. This is so evil by Bora! . At one point the Bennett group got to about 20m off the lead group, & Bora just attacked again! Gap going back up, and second group scrambling to keep going.

Yeah, that’s what I think. 3 Norwegian pre-Xmas meets, 3 German post-Xmas, then maybe CZE, SLO, SLV....it can be done.

Usually Sagan makes up points by hanging on for intermediate points in the big mountain stages long after all the other sprinters have dropped out the back, so we’ll have to wait.

Ineos not able to pull the break back, lead is growing if anything

Onto the last big set of climbs now. Breakaway now getting pegged back.

Boassen-Hagen gets the 20 Green points, based on the theory that half-a-dozen people ahead of him are going to drop out between now & Paris. Now the peloton’s turn....Bennett gets it, and a couple of people between him & Sagan. Bennett 129 Sagan 117

85k to go, break still has 6 mins, which is taking a bit of a risk. Obviously planning to get it all in the final climb. And of course as soon as I type it, the hammer goes down.

Worst comes to the worst we get an all-German year.

Was a bit surprised, big battle at the start then they just gave up and the break got 4 minutes. Good news for Sam Bennett, won’t be enough points for Sagan. Now 6 minutes.

Off we go.....is there going to be any racing today? Attacks off the front straight away.

But not so autonomous as to do without Govt funding, though?

Tv did not pick it up, must have been the race officials. Or Mitchelton-Scott

Fiat justitia, ruat cælum

Sorry, there are some things even God cannot do & forming a Belgian government is one of them. If you asked Him to do it, he’d soon be looking through his old notes from the time of Noah’s Ark.

A perfect recommendation for the world’s most important job, then.

Sure, but when Trump does a rally he goes out & does impro for an hour, so naturally it sometimes veers off on a tangent. It is literally over six months since Biden did a proper campaign event or a press conference.

Van Aert gets the sprint, think Bennett got one-two places over Sagan. Caleb Ewan not in it.

20k to go now, something is going to happen.

Some action! 1 KoM point awarded to the KoM jersey wearer, Cosnefroy. 50k to go.

He’s gone. Completely senile. Can only read from a teleprinter or Ipad, even when doing TV interviews, which must be carefully scripted in advance. Cannot answer a spontaneous question. Even when he is reading, if he loses his place he cannot get it back again or correct himself. Look at this clip where he loses his place. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8688775/Gaffe-prone-Joe-Biden-struggles-impact-COVID.html

No sign of any action, so for a while.