One week in to the Tour, Tomblaine, neighbor to yesterday's arrival host town of Nancy, was the site of today's departure.
The bunting and decorations were already up while the booths were being erected when I arrived.
Cyril Lemoine, likely enjoying his final day in the climber's jersey before the main climbers get an opportunity to shine in today's stage, was the first to sign on.
When the Tour is in France, the first rider to sign on places helmets on school kids. I'm not sure they explained this to Lemoine as he just handed them their helmets.
At stage 7, I met an American who was an avid rider but relatively new to the world of pro cycling. He joined us at today's sign on so we did our best to get him autographs from the American riders as well as other peloton favorites. We did pretty well, getting him signatures from Ben King, Alex Howes, Pete Stetina, and th monarch of all things maple syrup, Ted King.
My favorite Latvian rider, Gatis Smukukis, signed several autographs.
With a separated shoulder, Marcus Burghardt has been struggling with his injury but said he's looking forward to the the upcoming rest day. He wasn't the only rider already looking forward to a well earned day off on Tuesday!
Cheng Ji, Albert Timmer, and Tom Veelers of Giant join the queue at the start line.
Meanwhile, their teammate John Degenkolb was busy signing autographs before dashing back to the team buses.
A man who knows how to self-promote, when Degenkolb returned from the buses, he handed me a stack of hats for us!
Jan Bakelants stopped by to say hi with cotton clumps hanging out of his nose. I asked if he'd gotten into a fight on the bus but he assured me all was well within the team.
The peloton.
Bryan Coquard and a Cofidis colleague shared a conversation and a granola bar ahead of the start.
I didn't get to see much of the start!
The first real day in the mountains saw a 4 man break go clear with some of my favorite riders: Blel Kadri, Niki Terpstra, Simon Yates, Sylvain Chavanel. In the end, Blel Kadri rode away from his fellow escapees to grab the stage and the polka dot jersey.
Today's 17 autographs came from: 5 Mikel Nieve, 11 Alejandro Valverde, 22 Vladimir Isaychev, 28 Simon Špilak, 35 Michael Morkov, 57 Jean-Marc Marino, 78 Niki Terpstra, 81 Jean-Christophe Péraud, 86 Blel Kadri, 88 Matteo Montaguti, 109 Tom Veelers, 152 Bryan Coquard, 182 Michael Albasini, 205 Bartosz Huzarski, 206 Tiago Machado, 212 Jean-Marc Bideau, and 218 Benoît Jarrier.
