Love is a Battlefield

Hard as a motherf*cker.

Straight up, Rui.

WHY ARE THEY SHOWING ME THIS. My heart is effing BROKEN, John needs to win today or the next day or sometime soon please when will John win??

Wait, which one is New Zealand's Ambassador?

Well that's very touching, if a bit strange with the bike gear on. Very sweet.

... Left the jokers on the bus then, did they?

Oooh my first Periscope!

Oh hello, this is strange and excellent.

It's very busy.

BEAUTIFUL JOHN YOU BEAUTIFUL MAN

They're like in a dingy, muddy carpark.


Everyone's at the Powerbar Buffet now.

ADAM! Walking gingerly up the steps.

Contador looks like he's wearing a kevlar vest.

Richie? ... We've panned away.

Ah there he is. He has a very kindly face.

Who's that Garmindale?

Now we're chasing people down the road.

Oh I guess they're lining up at the start.

Yeah it's over.

Well that was excellent.

So can you watch back a Periscope? Or is it like Snapchat? Am I 100 years old?

LET'S GO TONY!

What a view.

I've always liked you, VDV.

I have no objectivity. I know today isn't even necessarily a stage for John but I like so desperately want him to win I can barely stand it. And in keeping with the theme of EXTREME DISAPPOINTMENT followed by EXTREME ELATION (and a yellow jersey), IT WOULD BE SO RIGHT.

I'm sure he's an expert in both.

A crash already??

This is like when Froomey inexplicably pitched over in the neutral zone that one time.

No news beyond the fact that DeGendt was involved.

Oh and Nacer and the entire Cofidis team, according to cyclingnews.

Oh cripes Nacer has abandoned.

Well that got serious quickly.

I BELIEVE IN YOU JOHN!

I like his snug little sweatwear & shorts thing going on here.

Oh Jens you know you're beautiful.

Thibaut Pinot Will Only Ride Thibaut Pinot's Bike. I hadn't seen PhilGil's gang fight before. Those were great.

Tony's a cutie.

Is Juans To Watch a real segement??!! Why is ITV doing recaps til 2???

He DID make his own faith! MAKE YOUR OWN FAITH TOO JOHN!

Pete and Luke up front. Kwiato not far away.

Dan fell over AGAIN!??

Sky are having a fuckin' LAUGH! Little Pete Kennaugh is practically falling off his bike guffawing and G is cracking up behind

Maybe about mystery teammate having a wee a few rows back?

He likes a bit of an uphill ramp.

JUAN. 

Oh cripes what's this. Coquard went down. Papa Voeckler stopped very calmly, picked up his bike, checked his wheels and sorted him out. Merci Papa!

#NeverForget.

Another crash apparently!

The unluckiest souls Thibaut Pinot and Tyler Farrar involved at least.

Nico??

He's back up apparently but still.

BOOM. We've got a split here.

Might've been because of the crash though, not the winds. I got too OPQS-excited there.

Julien and G and Roy and Sinkledam and John up at the front.

God Paul got bored during his own description of tire pressure just then.

Quintana's having some unluck this Tour, isn't he? He's up out of a ditch and onto a teammate's bike.

Gruppo compatto.

By that I mean those two groups are back together. That solo dude is still out there a bit.

That's a fucking headwind to be going into!

G's balancing and getting his jacket off-- look mum no hands!

Lest we forget, G is a fucking ninja.

Nearly to the intermediate sprint.

LEAD US OUT ROY

Ugh. Greipel.

John still got 15 points.

Hey Kwiato!

Really? "Individual tombs" is what we go to commercial with?

NOW gruppo compatto for real.

Feedin' time.

UGH how many commercials do they wanna go to??

Plus twitter seems to be experiencing its own Grand Tour fatigue. Luckily TheJensie is on a jolly day out and keeping us amused.

Allo Nico.

Hendy! Hendy I love you!

Oh Bling. He is suffering at the way way back here.

They keep puting the camera on him. JESUS.

Nathan in third position there.

Hendy where's you partner in crime??

They've suddenly 'turned the screw' and they are PUSHING.

WIND SPLITS.

Cannondale leading the charge.

Oss and BMC not far behind. 

WHAT?!!!??? JACK BAUER has abandoned?!?!?!? THERE WAS NO WARNING OF THIS!

BMC to the front. They are SCREAMING along.

Woah, gaps, long lines, yowza.

#rain #rain as we come back from commercial.

Seem to have a split for reals here but it's an enormous first group and all the big players are in it.

So basically they've just dropped the wounded chaff. Not exactly leave no man behind.

Is that Stevo Cummings leading Peloton 2?

Yes indeed. HEY STEVE!

Quite a few of these riders caught out because they were injured the other day. Yeah.

THE GLASSES ARE COMIN' OFF. Le Crow looks like he's revving up.

Everyone out in team lines.

UMMMM. That was almost insane. A police motorbike fell over, didn't hit anyone, but it nearly fucking took out all of Sky. NOT COOL.

Cav having a bike change with Julien for company. Brian's out of the car personally, wearing shorts in this weather.

Team Time Trial getting Cav back to the group.

They're close, it'll be ok.

I mean it's fucking hard going but they're in sight.

STYBY will take you there.

Fuckin' hell Julien just got back on and is already going back to the car again.

He's been a star this Tour already, he's on the front all the time.

The wounded deer peloton is over 2 minutes back now.

It's Papa Bernaudeau's birthday today? There aren't any Bernaudeau's in the race these days are there? No one around to do a Rick?

Richie and Little Pete caught out in Peloton Deer??

But literally where is Sammy Sanchez? I know we're not yet in his terrain, but right now I don't believe he's in this race.

Nico, Stannard, G and Froomey conversing. Leo riding the front.

Tiny John's tiny head poppin' up mid-front there.

Francois Faber was never found?? 

Oh! Maybe I can find Sammy!

Or maybe not.

Huh. It claimed he was in the front peloton. But then it wouldn't let me search for another rider, so I relaunched the website and searched for someone I knew was in the second peloton, and it told me they were in the front peloton.

So. Ou est Sammy?

Yeah. It doesn't work. Everyone is in the Leader Group apparently.

Well it managed to peg Luke Durbridge at 3 minutes back. He may not even still be in the race.

Leo the Lion King having a little snack.

Is Peter very tall? He looks like a horse on the front of this group.

Seriously. The Jensie was telling us how riders mid-pack may be falling asleep in this lull. I know the feeling.

OMG everyone is bored.

The best description of weather ever: It's not the time to learn how to fly a light aircraft.

Hey Koen!

Of course we pan out when I had nearly all the BMCs accounted for EXCEPT ONE.

Nathan! Oh he needs service, he's not flagging.

Maybe he's like WHY DIDN'T ANYONE TELL ME ABOUT JACK??

Bottles are flying!

Peloton Deer is out to 4 and a half minutes. What's the time cut gonna be?

Ooof. 5 and a half now.

Oh crash!!

They're sliding everywhere.

I think it's in Peloton Deer?

Oh no it's like the ENTIRE second half of the front group!

Pippo down again. And Unlucky Thibaut. Wow.

OH a Katusha just lost his front wheel MASSIVELY and took someone out and BAM.

Looks like Farrar standing on the side of the road. Could he possibly be having MORE bad luck?

GreenEdge is having THE WORST Tour ever.

People are joining back on.

Glimpse of Geschke's Beard.

Oh Leo got caught up in that but they say he's ok!

OMFG. I'm gonna be sick.

SEVEN MINUTES back is Peloton Deer.

John looks like he's on Cav's wheel.

Composition at the front getting a bit murkier.

Trek's come up. Tinkoff all over.

BMC pulling.

Geshke's Beard comin up!

What's.. Oh it's MTN at the front for the first time.

Oh there keep being splits in the road around traffic furniture and it's all so fluid!

6k. GC teams still on the front.

WHY DOES THE PLAYER CUT OUT

YOU CANNOT PUT ON PAWN STARS

FUCK YOU ITV

Oh merciful god I've got Eurosport going now

JESUS. 3.3 to go.

2.6k.

It's all over it's crazy.

Tony leading the group round the corner!

Cav is fourth in the line.

GIANT IS COMING UP

John is third in line

I could throw up!!!!

500m!!!!!!!!!

John's far back

IOH GOD HE'S TRYING TO COME UP

He won't

He can't he's boxed.

I can't tell who's where except Kristoff is there

CAV

COME ON CAV

NO Greipel is back??!?!

Boo.

Fuuuuuuckin' hell. Etc.

This is incredible. GoPro footage has been such an amazing addition to coverage.