Nibali finishes in 15’39”, ahead of Froome, Contador and Quintara. But Rohan Dennis is top of the pile tonight, the first wearer of the yellow jersey thanks to his record-breaking ride.
Nibali goes through the first checkpoint 11 seconds behind Dennis but, more significantly, that time suggests he is going to be the best placed of the pre-Tour favourites at the end of the first stage ...
Froome will be happy with his start, as he comes in with a time of 15’46”.
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Contador crosses after 15’54”, four seconds ahead Quintara.
Tony Martin: I’m very very disappointed. I couldn’t handle the heat, especially in the second half where I felt weaker
Van Garderen makes a decent start to his Tour, his time of 15’38 puts him 20th overall.
Dennis will be wearing the yellow jersey tonight! Cancellara looked set to rip it off his back but he couldn’t keep up the pace in the last few kilometres and wound up crossing seven seconds behind the Australian.
Vincenzo Nibali is the last man out. Meanwhile, Cancellara is hurtling towards the finishing line ...
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Cancellara has just over 2kms to go - and it’s going to be tight between him and Dennis! Meanwhile, off pops Jean-Christope Peruad.
Chris Froome is go, straight after Contador.
Cancellara has blasted through the checkpoint just one second slower than Dennis!
Sagan finish in 15’37”, which equates to 17th place overall. Then Thomas flies over the line with a time that puts him 11th overall.
Geraint Thomas is on the road. And Fabian Cancellara has just started - is he the only man left with a realistic chance of eclipsing Dennis today?
Andrew Talanky, the newly crowned American time trial champions, begins his Tour. Alberto Contador will do likewise in a mo.
Martin misses Dennis’ target by five seconds, and the Australian, watching at the finishing house, heaves a sigh of relief!
A mistake by Martin, who misjudged a left turn, looks like keeping Dennis on top, unless the German can atone in the last 4kms.
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Lars Boom, he of the low cortisone levels, has just hit the road.
Peter Sagan has just begun. Meanwhile, Brandle finishes in 15’20”, which puts him at fifth overall. Martin has just passed the first checkpoint jsut three seconds down on Dennis.
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Off goes Alejandro Valverde, just before Great Britain champion Alex Dowsett crosses the line with a time of 15’32”m which puts him seventh in the overall standings so far. But Tony Martin is about to take off: time for Dennis to worry?
Dumoulin overtakes his minute man, Portugal’s Machado, and then crosses the line ... nearly nine seconds behind Dennis! It was a thrilling attempt and puts the Dutchman in second place overall, while underlining what an incredible ride Dennis put in earlier.
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As the crowd lining the route - ten deep on either side - continue to roar on Dumoulin, the camera pans to Dennis, who appears to be following the Dutchman’s progress with a certain nervousness. Only 4km till we find out whether his time is still top ...
At the half way stage, Dumoulin is lagging just one second behind Dennis! Can he, like the Australian, pick up the pace even more in the second half? The race is on!
It’s looking like the din created by the Utrecht crowd might just spur Dumoulin on to an historic feat: after 4km he’s on target to surpass Dennis’ record time!
Get a load of this.
Astana, the team of defending champion Vincenzo Nibali, invited further scrutiny over its moral code after announcing that the Dutch rider Lars Boom would start the Tour de France on Saturday.
The 29-year-old rider has not failed a drugs test, but as Astana are members of the Movement for Credible Cycling (MPCC) he should, under the organisation’s voluntary code, be removed from competition for a period of eight days after returning cortisol levels under the normal level.
Nicolas Roche, on the day after his 31st birthday, finishes 1’20” behidn the leader. Then Tom Dumoulin, the local hero, exits the starting house to tremendous acclaim from the Dutch crowd. Will be be the man to topple Dennis?
Vanmarcke faded in the second half of his ride, finishing 49 seconds behind Dennis, with Van Emden and Nicolas Castroviejo still second and third.
Nicolas Roche is on the road. Meanwhile, Sep Vanmarcke has just gone through the first checkpoint just 13 seconds down on Dennis’ time, which, remember, is the fastest ever in a Tour de France time trial. Still some big hitters to come, mind.
Adam Yates begins his Tour, and moments later Kennaugh finishes his first out outing, 1’08” behind Dennis - and Pinot, who has put in a hell of a second half to this time trial, careers in just behind him, and only 41 seconds down on Dennis. More pertinently in the grand scheme of things, that ride puts Frenchman is ahead of Quintana.
André Greipel reaches the end with a creditable time, 1’12’ behind Dennis.
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Jungels finishes 38 seconds behind Dennis’ but that’s a superb effort for a 22-year-old making his Tour debut. And it puts him sixth overall at the moment.
Jungels is living up to the hype - he’s just blasted past his minute man. Hesjedal, meanwhile, has just finished 1’15 behind Dennis’ record-breaking time.
Peter Kennaugh is off! The British road racing champion is followed out of the start house by Thibaut Pinot, one of the French favourites.
With none of the big names out on the road at the moment, the cameraman decides to allude to a start from a different sport, by showing the local football stadium, the Stadion Galgenwaarrd, whose claim to fame is that it was the venue for the 2005 World Youth Championship final. Argentina beat Nigeria in that with two goals from guess who.
Ryder Hesjedal, whose parents obviously had some sort of prophesy about his future profession when naming him, is hurtling along at a fair clatter. But still no one looks like matching Dennis’ feat. Let’s see if Bob Jungels, the pride of Luxembourg, can pull off a sensation in his first Tour: he’s just blasted out of the truck.
Meanwhile, here’s a question for you, readers: “I think it was in the Guardian that I read that this year France has the best chance since the great Bernard Hinault in 1985 of winning,” chirps Andrew Benton. “But there are a lot of excellent cyclists in contention,. Who do you think are the serious contender (and why)?”
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Jan Bakelants is the latest out of the block, if that is the correct term. Although it looks more like the riders start their time trails by being shoved out of the back of a truck and down a ramp. Anyway, let’s see if the Belgian can beat Van Emden’s time for the first half in this stage, which stands at 7’27” - even faster than Dennis’, who, of course, turned on the turbo power (not literally, despite all that recent talk about “mechanical doping”) in the second half to set his extraordinary overall time.
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Quintana has crossed the line in a time 61 seconds slower than Dennis’ lightning ride but that’ll do the Colombian nicely for a start. He’ll make up that time on the Australian - and the 13 others currently ahead of him - in the next stages and probably won’t finish as far behind the favourites as he might have feared from a discipline he dreads.
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I’m off (cycling home of course) and so will hand over to the very capable hands of Paul Doyle. Enjoy the rest of the time trial. Bye!
Nairo Quintana is in the saddle – the time trial may not be the Colombia’s favourite part of the Tour but he will hope to post a competitive time. Colombia’s national record holder, Rigoberto Urán, is also out of the track. His father was assassinated by Colombian paramilitary groups by the way. He’s come in at 15min36sec, which is sixth place.
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What an incredible ride! Dennis has just gone sub 15 minutes! His official time is 14min56sec! That time could go the distance. We could well have an Aussie in yellow before the end of the day. Dennis has considerable pedigree – setting the hour record (before Dowsett and Wiggins) and pipping Ritchie Porte to the Tour Down Under earlier this year.
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Rohan Dennis is absolutely flying! The Australian zooms past Lars Ytting Bak, who started out a full minute ahead of him. Wow.
Here is the current top 10 …
TOP 10 après le départ de 43 coureurs / after the departure of 43 riders. #TDF2015 pic.twitter.com/3P7Iz0RP0Y
— Le Tour de France (@letour) July 4, 2015
Team Sky’s Ritchie Porte is out on the track and has just gone through the 10km point. Our leader at the moment is local favourite Jos van Emden who has come through in 15min11sec.
Mark Cavendish is safely out of the blocks and cooly coasts round the narrow first corner. He had a shocking first stage in last year’s Tour, crashing horrifically just 250m from the finish line. Ouch. Cavendish dislocated his shoulder and was forced to withdraw from last year’s Tour because of the crash and so will be eager to make up for it this year.
Alex Dowsett – one of the Brits today that has a genuine chance of taking yellow here, he’s 33-1 with the bookies – has been talking to the cameras:
I didn’t think I had a chance of being here. It’s been a struggle to get my legs back after the hour record but I had a good national championships and got the call up. I got a message on Monday morning saying I’m in!
On the course:
It’s a short club turn isn’t it?. There are some massive dreams to take yellow today but my main aim for being here is to helpe Nairo [Quintana] win it. That’s my sole focus after Saturday.
For more info on Dowsett’s hour record, have a read of this.
The 26-year-old beat mark set by Australian Rohan Dennis by 446m, with a total distance of 52.937km. That was in May, remember, before Bradley Wiggins re-beat the record last month.
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Welcome everyone! We’re already underway here in Utrecht and the first rider out of the blocks, Daniel Teklehaimanot, has clocked a time of 7min54sec on the 7km split, which is just over halfway round the course. That gives everyone an idea of what we’re aiming for.
Teklehaimanot went out at 1pm BST and there will be a rider released from the start line on the minute, every minute. Mark Cavendish will start at 1.32pm BST incidentally. All the big hitters – Tony Martin, Nibali, Froome, Contador, etc – are towards the back of the field, and be staggered at after 4pm BST.
Michael will be here shortly. In the meantime take a look at our lavish stage-by-stage interactive.
Here’s what to expect from stage one:
Pancake flat and with a whole lot of corners, this the only individual time trial in the three weeks of racing but it is longer than most prologues and with some 20 corners it entails greater bike-handling skills than the usual contre la montre, plus the ability to push back up to cruising speed time after time.
On an urban course, any rain will turn this into a slithery lottery and present overall contenders with a brutal dilemma: how much do I risk? How much can I afford to lose? Fabian Cancellara is the usual man to beat, but the big favourite looks to be Tom Dumoulin of Giant-Alpecin.
