79: Stage 1 | Brussels – Brussels | Tour de France 2019

Published: July 6, 2019, 8:05 p.m.

The Tour de France is off and running and Richard Moore, Lionel Birnie and François Thomazeau are in the centre of Brussels to discuss the opening stage.

The identity of the winning team was not a surprise but no one will have predicted Mike Teunissen would have ended the day in the yellow jersey. The Jumbo-Visma rider saved the day after his team’s sprinter Dylan Groenewegen crashed inside the final two kilometres.

We discuss the unconventional sprint finish and here from Jumbo-Visma rider Amund Grondahl Jansen and sports director Grischa Niermann.

There was also a crash for one of the pre-Tour favourites Jakob Fuglsang and we weigh up the likely impact of that before discussing the fall-out from Dimension Data’s decision not to select Mark Cavendish – or more to the point the differing accounts of how the team was picked from team owner Doug Ryder and sports director Rolf Aldag.

In the final part there’s the first instalment of our new series Outside the Team Bus with Alex Dowsett.

The Cycling Podcast is supported by Rapha and Science In Sport.

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