Stage 1: St George - St George

Tour de Beauce Bell
Unrelenting courses full of hills, rain and crummy roads - welcome to Beauce, a 6 day race held outside of Quebec City. From the weather forecasts it's looking like the race will live up to its reputation; they're calling for rain everyday.

Zach and I are here with the National team, trying to get some results and build on the form gained from our European trip. For this edition of the race the traditional hilltop finish on Megantic - a 5km climb at 18% - has been taken out, leaving everyone guessing as to how the racing would shape up. Many were saying that things would be more aggressive as riders tried to steal time in breaks. In the end today's first stage set the stage for the coming week with a break that gained a minute on the pack. I don't think that it means GC is sealed up but it will mean that one of the teams will be trying to control things.

The Canadian team missed the break when it happened, which left us with the job of helping with the chase in the last 20km. With the break at 2 minutes it was too late to bring them back but at least we could try and limit the damage.

I'm not sure how the legs are, I was okay today but nothing special. Maybe I'll improve as the week goes on, let's hope so. Now it's time to catch some zzz's, 'till tomorrow.