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2017 Tour de France: Stage 4 live race updates, blog

4th July, 2017
Start: Mondorf-les-Bains
Finish: Vittel
TV: Live, SBS
Online: Live, Cycling Central

Top ten general classification
1. Geraint Thomas (Sky) @ 10:00:31
2. Chris Froome (Sky) + 0:12
3. Michael Matthews (Sunweb) + 0:12
4. Peter Sagan (Bora) + 0:13
5. Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data) + 0:16
6. Pierre Latour (AG2R) + 0:25
7. Philippe Gilbert (Quickstep) + 0:30
8. Michal Kwiatkowski (Sky) + 0:32
9. Tim Wellens (Lotto-Soudal) + 0:32
10. Nikias Arndt (Sunweb) + 0:34
Can Andre Greipel win Stage 4 of the Tour de France? (Image: Sky).
Roar Guru
4th July, 2017
91

Stage 4 of the Tour de France sees the riders go uphill all day, but the long gradual rise shouldn’t prevent the sprinters from having their second opportunity at victory. Join The Roar for live coverage from 10pm (AEST).

The stage will see the riders complete the relatively flat 207.5-kilometre journey from Mondorf-les-Bains to Vittel. As mentioned earlier the stage travels uphill, but nothing that should intrigue the riders, with the stage only increasing in elevation by 150 metres from the start to the end point.

The first 150 kilometres are fairly pointless to put it bluntly. You can call today a transition stage, as tomorrow we will see the first mountain top finish at the top of La Planche des Belles Filles.

The intermediate sprint comes after 157.5 kilometres, with it being immediately followed by the only categorised climb of the day, the fourth category climb of the Col des Trois Fontaines. The climbed is punchy, averaging 7.4 per cent for two kilometres.

The final five kilometres of the stage are quite tricky, with the run into the finish getting technical about 2.5 kilometres from the line. Two 90 degree bends just outside the final kilometre will make positioning paramount on the final run up to the line.

With lead outs being poorly executed on Stage 2, the teams of the sprinters will be needing to present their sprinter into perfect position to launch at 150 metres to go. Any earlier and they will be get swamped by their competitors in the finale.

It will be hard to bet against Marcel Kittel (Quick Step Floors) today, with the German currently in the green jersey after a superb victory on Stage 2, where he come from a long way back in the final 500 metres to cruise to victory.

Join The Roar live coverage of Stage 4 of the Tour de France from 10pm (AEST).

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