Reigning Olympic time trial champion Remco Evenepoel should be a major factor in Caen as Tadej Pogacar, Mathieu van der Poel battle for overall lead.

Evenepoel, the reigning time trial Olympic and world champion, was expected to win the stage in the absence of time trial specialists — Filippo Ganna and Stefan Bissegger, who both crashed and exited the race on the first day of the Tour last week.

In fact it truly kicked off yesterday, with Tadej Pogacar putting a handful more seconds into his rivals to move level on time with race leader Mathieu van der Poel by claiming his 18th Tour stage win and the 100th of his frankly ludicrously brilliant career.