Ever wondered what the riders get up to on a rest day during a Grand Tour? A bit of shopping, perhaps? Some sightseeing? Maybe even a day away from the machines on which they will be covering 3,400km over the space of three weeks? Oh, if only …

The term ‘rest day’ is a bit of a misnomer if ever there was one. In fact it’s very rare for a cyclist to actually ‘rest’ on such days. Even though they’ve only ridden three stages, almost everyone will have a build up of lactic acid in the legs so the riders will have rolled out in groups yesterday for a couple of hours’ reasonably hard riding, just to work those muscles. Given that it’s the team time trial today, some may have taken the opportunity to give the course a thorough once over and even put in some rare, and possibly much-needed, time-trialing practice with their teammates.

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