Sunday 04 July 2010 at 01h35

This afternoon the prologue of the Tour de France 2010 took place in Rotterdam in The Netherlands. For the 4th time in the history of the Tour de France, Fabian Cancellara (Team Saxo Bank) won this initial individual time trial and thus took the first yellow jersey of the 97th edition of the Tour.

Partially run under the rain, this time trial has become more dangerous for some riders, but Spartacus was lucky ... the sun popped through again when he did his solitary effort.

The summary of the prologue of the Tour de France 2010

The Dutch spectators were quite numerous at the start in Rotterdam but I think they were less than expected. Maybe the bad weather kept people at home watching the prologue on TV ?!

Quite quickly after the start of this prologue at 4.15PM, the German rider Tony Martin (HTC-Columbia) set the best time at 10'10". Indeed, usually the best riders start latest in a prologue, but several teams tried to let their best riders ride without rain: by betting on the rain to arrive at the end of the day, they made them start early and Tony Martin thus came to the start in the 11th position, without rain but with a humid road anyway.

His time was maintained as the reference time for a very long time, until Fabian Cancellara (Team Saxo Bank), who started among the last riders to start, gets over it for 10 seconds! Spartacus didn't use a motor to do so (his bike was one of the 14 bikes being scanned by the UCI), but he was lucky with the changing weather. Indeed, it stopped raining and when the Swiss was doing his time trial, even the sun came through. He thus probably managed to take the bends a bit easier and faster than the German rider who was on a humid road.

Among the favourites of this Tour de France 2010 we should of course mention the very good performance of Lance Armstrong (Team Radioshack) who recently announced this will be his last Tour. He finished in 10'22" and thus took the 4th place in this prologue. The other big favourite, Alberto Contador (Astana) follows the American rider at 4 seconds and even though the time difference thus is quite small, this is a psychological disappointment for El Pistolero !
The Schleck brothers (Team Saxo Bank) were a bit disappointing, with Fränk in 79th position at 0'57" and his younger brother Andy in 122nd position at 1'09" behind Cancellara.
The winner of the Tour de France 2008, Carlos Sastre (Cervélo TestTeam) is at 54 seconds behind the Swiss rider while Cadel Evans (BMC Racing Team) is 39 seconds behind, just like Luis Léon Sanchez (Caisse d'Epargne) while his homonym, Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel-Euskadi), is 56 seconds behind.

Mathias Frank, the young Swiss rider of the BMC Racing Team fell during this time trial and had to give up. Manuel Cardoso (Footon-Servetto) also fell but he will most probably be at the start anyway tomorrow. The peloton will thus contain 196 riders at the start of the stage from Rotterdam to Brussels.

The photos of the prologue of the Tour de France 2010

You can check out a selection of my photos for the Tour de France 2010 here!

The classifications of the Tour de France 2010 after the prologue

Stage, general and points classification

After this prologue, the stage ranking, the general classification and the classification by points is of course exactly the same. Their top 10 now is as follows:
1/ Fabian Cancellara (Team Saxo Bank) - 10'00"
2/ Tony Martin (HTC-Columbia) - +00'10"
3/ David Millar (Garmin-Transitions) - +00'20"
4/ Lance Armstrong (Team Radioshack) - +00'22"
5/ Geraint Thomas (Team Sky) - +00'23"
6/ Alberto Contador (Astana) - +00'27"
7/ Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Transitions) - +00'28"
8/ Levi Leipheimer (Team Radioshack) - +00'28"
9/ Edvald Boasson Hagen (Team Sky) - +00'32"
10/ Linus Gerdemann (Team Milram) - +00'35"

Best young rider classification

Thanks to his second place in today's stage and thus in the general classification, Tony Martin (HTC-Columbia) takes the first white jersey of this Tour de France 2010.
Here's the top 10 of the best young rider classification:

1/ Tony Martin (HTC-Columbia) - 10'10"
2/ Geraint Thomas (Team Sky) - +00'13"
3/ Edvald Boasson Hagen (Team Sky) - +00'22"
4/ Adriano Malori (Lampre-Farnese Vini) - +00'25"
5/ Roman Kreuziger (Liquigas-Doimo) - +00'28"
6/ Kristjan Koren (Liquigas-Doimo) - +00'32"
7/ Daniel Oss (Liquigas-Doimo) - +00'33"
8/ Lars Boom (Rabobank) - +00'34"
9/ Ignatas Konovalovas (Cervélo TestTeam) - +00'34"
10/ Rein Taaramae (Cofidis) - +00'35"

door Thomas Vergouwen
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this publication is published in: Tour de France | Tour de France 2010

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