Tour de Farce: Look mum, no handlebars!

Stage one of the Tour de France - the culmination of months of meticulous training, planning and preparation. You are ready for anything... then two minutes later your handlebars come off. Poor Dominik Nerz.

What with the gruelling heatwave that has spread across Europe this past week, one team mechanic got round the roasting problem with a unique water spray.

Elsewhere, one glamorous fan unleashed a triple threat of hat, fan and parasol to combat the tarmac melting temperatures.

Manx Missile Mark Cavendish summed up the family feel to the 2015 Grand Depart by chilling out with his wife and daughter before embarking on his opening TT effort.

The first rider off is always a special occasion and it was apt that Eritrean climber Daniel Teklehaimanot was the first man down the ramp after his sizzling recent exploits on the road for MTN-Qhubeka, who are the first African team to enter the world's blue-riband cycling event.

Meanwhile the Tour is renowned for its aerial helicopter shots and the local Dutch club FC Utrecht duly obliged with a giant jersey on their pitch.

Can it really be 30 years since a Frenchman last won Le Tour? Afraid so with Bernard Hinault's 1985 victory in desperate need of being eclipsed. No pressure on Thibaut Pinot's shoulders then!

Most time-trial leaders only have to wait a few minutes to see if they've won. Not Rohan Dennis. His comically long wait in front of the TV cameras as fellow TT specialists failed abysmally over and over to beat his stupendous time meant he was having to plaster the smile on for what felt like days.

When someone finally did challenge Dennis' time, he nearly ended up crashing spectacularly as Tom Dumoulin flew around the final corner and nearly into the rear of Tiago Machado before crossing the line moments ahead of the shell-shocked Portuguese rider.

The hype machine has been in overdrive this past week bigging up the Froome v Contador rivalry. Sadly for them, they both fizzled on the day.

Consequently, it was left to perma-grin Dennis to lap up the adulation, podium girls, cuddly toys and royalty in the form of Dutch King Willem-Alexander ahead of Sunday's crosswind heavy trip from Utrecht to the coastal finish at Zeeland.