The race begins...

Like every office monkey, I live for the weekend. Not least, for the time being, because I can actually get to watch some Tour de France. This weekend I got lucky with stage fifteen.

It felt like I got to watch the Tour start proper, as the battle for the Maillot Jaune got blown wide open by CSC Saxo Bank's pressure on Cadel Evans. He got dropped by Frank Schleck by eight seconds, whilst the stage was won by Simon Gerrans in part of an epic race long breakaway.

Awesome!

On top of a day of very changeable weather, nasty crashes (how about that double sided roundabout collapse) and a frantic Italian crowd I reckon I got my value for money.

Now its back to the live text updates from the BBC for my kicks...