Greig Leach

The Tour de France is full of traditions, and hold overs from days gone by. Before the edition of race radios, the riders kept taps on the where abouts of the breaks and peloton by a moto carrying a chalkboard and showing the time gaps to each group. With all of the information available to the team directors in the team cars, this is now basically a cute hold-over complete with an attractive woman holding up the chalkboard for the rider's momentary distraction. In fact, it only seems to be Jerome Cousin (Direct Energie) that is even giving the moto more than a passing glance. Guillaume Van Kiersbulck (Wanty-Groupe Gobert) along with the Cofidis riders, Anthony Peres and Dimitri Claeys, seemed to just be getting on with the job at hand.