Team Wednesday nearly rewrite the record books, but it won't count

Seven. That’s how many times Iain, racing for Team Wednesday, came within touching distance of his own history on a ride that will not appear in any classification table at all — a breakaway off the usual road home, ridden fast enough to make that footnote sting.

The number that matters most sits on Fiat to B&Q, ordinarily an 8:04 kind of stretch that Iain has never troubled the top of. Today he came second-best ever there, just 155 seconds off his own outright fastest, on a long flat drag that rewards exactly the sort of steady effort Team Wednesday’s puncheurs are meant to save for the hills. Audi Garage to Scotswood Bridge went the same way, second-best ever again, and Arrived at Graft and Have You Got A Rolls Royce Engine both followed suit within a handful of seconds of personal bests. Even Under the A1, a sprint, went third-best ever.

It kept going out past Lemington: Bells Close to Lemington Asda, Bells Close to Walbottle Rd and Lemington Asda to KB Cycles all landed second-best ever too, and the Newburn Sprint came in third. Under sunny skies and a mild 14.5°C, with none of the wind that usually unsettles a bridge crossing, conditions were about as forgiving as this Tour gets — though today’s route swerved past that particular test altogether.

None of it counts. Because the ride strayed from the recognised course, every one of those near-record splits goes into the log marked unofficial, and the general classification does not move an inch. Team Friday remain out in front on 25.1 km/h, twenty stages unbeaten since week one, with Team Wednesday still second at 23.42 km/h, 103 seconds per 10 km back. The defending champions have shown, on a stage that will not count, exactly the form that once won them a Tour. They will want it to count again soon.