CROWDS, DELAYS AND STRESS ON TOUR

'm feeling surprisingly chilled about heading into my first Tour de France. The laid-back approach has definitely worked best for me this year, so it'd feel wrong to change that now.

- LEWIS ASKEY

A delayed train threw a spanner in the works on Wednesday, turning the day into a bit of a travel slog. Add in a 7am blood test on Thursday morning - which I still detest - and I wasn't feeling my sprightliest.

After plenty of interviews, photos and meetings, we finally arrived at the team presentation in the centre of Lille. I spotted my parents and grandparents in the crowd, somehow managing to pick them out, which made an already special moment that much better.

It didn't take a genius to realise the crowd were on the hunt for free bidons, so I had a bit of fun with it, testing out different sections to see who could make the most noise and win mine. The atmosphere was surreal.

In the history of this team we've never had a special edition jersey for the Tour.