Depart Dinan

It was an earlier start this morning as we planned to try and catch the start of today's stage at Dinan. I drove out to Broons to reduce the ride to 30 miles or so - but Stuart and Conrad were there waiting for me as they'd had the benefit of a tail wind. Our route was pretty straightforward. When we got into Dinan the action was clearly taking place in the centre of the town where there were large crowds and a carnival atmosphere. We found our way around to the media compound but the teams were already gathering in the main street ready for the the depart. We got up there taking the bikes through the crowds about 5 minutes before the riders left - there were a few groups of them just in front of us, but not many we recognised.

After the riders had departed the team support cars laden with bikes and the team coaches squeezed there way through the narrow streets of this historic town.  Interesting to see the kit up close, but really we should've been out of bed an hour earlier to get to see the riders closer up in the media village.

We rode back into the headwind to Broons together, then we all loaded onto the car and drove back the remaining distance to Le Millet, which was just as well as the heavens opened on the way back and the guys would've been soaked.

Bianchisti Cymraeg En Francais

Stuart, Conrad and I are off to France a couple of months early - and that's only 2.5 weeks away now.  Really looking forward to a lads week away to watch the Tour de France.

The plan is a ferry with cabin then there's 3 days of tour stages within riding distance of our accomodation base.  Looks like a couple of 80 mile days and one of about 30 miles, so that'll be excellent training for L2P - it'll be the first time I've done some distance on my bike 3 days in succession.

We'll be seeing the stages that start in Lorient, Carhaix and Dinan which are in the North West.  See them on the route map here.

None of these look like they're favourable for Mark Cavendish (with the finish at the seaside in Cap Frehel being the least worst), but we can still hope!  It will all depend on the strength and quality of any breakaways that are created by the rolling nature of the climbs in the earlier parts of all three of these stages.   If there's a decent and sustained breakaway group and Cav's not in it, then its game over.  Brad Wiggins might be in for a shout though.  No doubt Stuart will be giving his Union Jack cycling jersey its annual provocative outing.

On a more general point, great to see the team time trial back on the agenda - that's one of the more interesting parts of the event for me.

No doubt the weather is going to be superb!