So far, so good may be the most apt way of summing up Pauline Ferrand-Prévot's Tour de France Femmes to this point, given the Visma-Lease a Bike rider, who is now far from the unknown quantity she was on her return last year, is looking well set for a spirited title defence in the mountains. But first there is a looming test in the one area where an element of mystery remains – the individual time trial.
The path to the 21km test against the clock on stage 4 has been relatively smooth, even after an unexpectedly explosive start that carried into Monday as the race moved from Switzerland to France. There may have been a key GC day ahead, but there was no sitting quietly to conserve ahead of the time trial battle.
