Tom Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers) said the heat played a major role in deciding the outcome of the opening stage of the Tour de France, adding some teams waited too long to properly take up the chase of the breakaway.
With Romain Bardet and young Team dsm-firmenich PostNL team mate Frank van den Broek holding off the peloton, by five seconds, for a memorable 1-2, Pidcock expressed his surprise that a breakaway was allowed make it all the way on the opening stage of the Tour.
"It was the weirdest stage I've ever done, I think," Pidcock said the finish in Rimini today after 206km in very hot conditions. "The heat… it was the first proper hot day in Europe for everybody, I don't anyone has raced in this heat yet this year.
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"No teams really wanted to take it up. The breakaway stayed away on the opening stage of the Tour de France, has that ever happened? I don't know.
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"And when teams did take it up nothing happened because everyone was so hot they were just gassed. Yeah, very, very strange.
"But I'm really happy because I was feeling rough at the (team) presentation… I was feeling very rubbish. So I'm actually very happy I got through today at the front.
"We'll go again tomorrow, there are more opportunities. We (as a team) were super today I think. Kwiato (Michał Kwiatkowski) was man of the match, he was really, really good today."
Pidcock added the fact six riders from Ineos Grenadiers were in the front group today was a good sign and meant the team could look forward to the next few stages with confidence.
