Highlights from stage two of the Tour of Britain 2023, held in and around Wrexham on Monday 4 September.
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00:00 The shortest stage in Tour of Britain history, a measly 109.9km from Wrexham to Wrexham.
00:09 Leaving the start line, which would, after a couple of hours of racing, become the finish line in the heart of Wrexham.
00:15 And criss-crossing the Anglo-Welsh border along the way as the race would dip into Cheshire, before crossing the border again and ending in Wrexham itself.
00:24 A peloton shorn of one or two members. Two riders down, just 94 starting the race in the absence of Flanders-Balois' Ward Van Hoof,
00:35 who didn't start after his crash on the run into the finish line in Deansgate yesterday.
00:39 And Jumbo-Visma looking to pick up where they left off after victory on stage one with Olaf Koi, the stage winner on stage one, in the leader's jersey.
00:47 Gouart Van Aert, his lead-out man, would be wearing the points jersey, even though he sits in second place in those standings.
00:54 And before the flag even dropped, there was an incident involving Carlos Rodriguez of the Ineos Grenadiers, their highly rated Spanish GC rider,
01:02 on the brink of signing a long-term new contract with Ineos Grenadiers, coming to grief.
01:07 But getting back on and appearing to be mostly unaffected from that spill.
01:11 After a couple of kilometres delay then, the flag dropped and in the first instance, there was no attempt to get in a breakaway.
01:17 On such a short stage, it was questionable whether the breakaway would have any chance of success at all.
01:22 Eventually then, a trio of riders, which would in time become a quartet of riders, did get away,
01:28 including Finn Crockett of Saint Pirren, Abraham Stockmann of TDT Unibet and Jake Scott of Bolton Equity's Black Spoke.
01:35 Those three riders established a small advantage on the road and then there was a counter-attack from the rider in green here.
01:41 And that was Callum Ormiston, the first time we've seen in this edition of the Tour of Britain a rider from Global Six Cycling getting up the road.
01:49 After a short effort, crossing over a gap that was around about 10 seconds, Ormiston made it to the front of the race
01:56 and those four riders started to hold on to an advantage that only very briefly, at one point in the race, went over a minute.
02:03 Fernando Gaviria came to grief early on, a heavy fall for Fernando Gaviria that would have consequences for him.
02:10 Removing some of the skin from the palm of his hand made bike handling very difficult for the Colombian,
02:14 who already in Manchester had had a torrid day of it, coming in two and a half minutes down on the race winner
02:20 and looking very uncomfortable after that fall. Fernando Gaviria not enjoying his start to the Tour of Britain.
02:26 The various different castles along the Welsh-English border marking the route
02:31 and a quartet of riders who never had much more than around about 35-45 seconds for the majority of this short 109.9 stage.
02:40 One categorised climb and one sprint, but both of those points lay further up the road in the final 20km of racing.
02:48 And it was only a Cat.3 climb at that, the climb to Aiden.
02:51 The main players in the King of the Mountains competition after yesterday, back in the peloton.
02:56 But Jake Scott in the purple of Bolton Equity's Black Spoke, a man who in the past has won the Tour of Britain King of the Mountains competition twice.
03:03 And then the man in the lead of that competition, James Fouché, counter-attacked on the climb to Aiden,
03:08 tried to ride across that short gap to steal some points at the top of the climb.
03:14 He didn't get first place, that went to Finn Crockett with his teammate Jake Scott in second place.
03:19 But you can see him there just crossing the line in fourth place. James Fouché picked up one King of the Mountains point to extend his advantage over Zeb Kiffin
03:27 in the overall standings of the King of the Mountains. So he'll be wearing the King of the Mountains jersey for another day on stage three.
03:33 Then on the run into the finish line, Trinity Racing had manoeuvred Luke Lamperty to the fore,
03:37 and Movistar looked very organised in support of their remaining sprinter Max Kanta.
03:41 Big crash there involving DSM, one rider just touching the shoulder of the race leader Olaf Koi and going down hard and at full speed.
03:49 But Eduardo Affini with Wout van Aert on his wheel had Olaf Koi's interest to look after.
03:54 Danny van Poppel though from Border Handsgrohe had Sam Bennett on his wheel,
03:58 and then Luke Lamperty of Trinity Racing with Tom Pidcock there had closed the gap to Bennett.
04:03 After Affini was done, it was down to Wout van Aert to lead out Koi.
04:07 At that point Danny van Poppel almost lost the wheel of Koi. Sam Bennett moved alongside his lead-out man,
04:12 then checked and reverted to plan A. Danny van Poppel at this point not sure where Sam Bennett is and sprinting for himself,
04:18 much to Bennett's annoyance, but the victory once again went to Olaf Koi.
04:23 And this time Wout van Aert sprinted to third place after the lead-out.
04:27 Another very impressive team performance from Jumbo Visma, executed to perfection by the young sprinting staff in the Netherlands.
04:33 Olaf Koi the winner ahead of Wout van Aert in third place, and this is the GC standings.
04:39 Van Aert holds on to second place on GC, Bennett still in third, Max Kanter in fourth,
04:43 and Tom Pidcock has moved himself at the end of two days of racing up to ninth place on GC,
04:49 one place better off than last year's winner, Gonzalo Serrano.
04:53 Serano.