FOR several days Chris Boardman has been looking anxiously at the lowering, windswept skies and making ominous mutterings to the effect that a single error in the crosswinds which have swept the Tour since the start in Holland can be as costly as a bad day in the mountains.
Yesterday, as the race headed eastwards, Boardman's worst fears came close to being confirmed when the race split to smithereens on a stretch of flat road which in calm conditions would not have troubled an old lady nipping down the shops for a baguette.
When the wind blows from the side, the riders spread diagonally across the road in a single line formation nicknamed the echelon, or l'eventail a fan. The size of each "fan" depends simply on how many riders can fit into the tarmac available between one gutter and the other and gain shelter from their fellows.
When the wind is also slightly behind, as it was yesterday, the high speed means that once a tiny gap appears between two "fans" there is no way back. At one point there were half a dozen "fans one behind the other, with most of the race favourites in the first.
Boardman was in the third, together with his team mate, race leader Frederic Moncassin. They both would have lost several minutes if it had not been for a change of direction in the road which meant the side wind became a headwind, suddenly and fortuitously slowing up the riders driving the front echelon.
That they were a virtual list of all the favourites Laurent Jalabert, Alex Zulle, Tony Rominger, Bjarne Riis, Miguel Indurain and their domestiques underlined that Boardman's plight, if temporary, was serious.
Ironically, all ended well for the Briton and his GAN team. Their French champion, Stephane Helot, spent much of the stage in a five man escape and ended the day by snaffling the yellow jersey from Moncassin, who received the green points leader's jersey as compensation.
The move clearly gave Indurain and Jalabert food for thought, as Heulot finished fourth one place ahead of Boardman in the Dauphine Libere stage race in June, which means he can climb and may enjoy more than a brief holiday in yellow.
The other escapee who may be seen again when the race reaches the Alps was Italian Mariano Piccoli, twice winner of the King of the Mountains jersey in the Tour of Italy. The Spaniard and the Frenchman were concerned enough to order their teams to reduce the break's lead from a vast 17 minutes to a more respectable five at the lakeside finish.
Here the surprise stage winner was Frenchman Cyril Saugrain, an ear ringed 23 year old ranked 573rd in the world. His Aubervillers team have a tiny budget compared to the big leaguers chasing behind, and their inclusion in the race was widely regarded as patriotic charity on the part of the organisers. Now,,) however, they will feel they have earned their place.
Weather experts say that in the next century global warming will give the south of England a climate similar to that of eastern France. One day, vast placards may tell us that working is "Champagne Country", but the Home Counties will probably never quite match the scenery along the Route Touristique de la Champagne, which took the race along a twisting course to the south of Reims, between serried ranks of verdant vines.
Each honey stone village had its own Premier Cru, which the locals dispensed liberally to the thirsty, motley crew known collectively as the Tour suiveurs.
The champagne was not the only thing to turn heads. Denmark's Bjarne Riis, who finished, third last year and has been looking ominously strong, came within, a tyre's width of crashing when the Czech Republic's Jan Svorada lost control and fell in the sprint for sixth place. The Dane has spent all year preparing for the Tour, but yesterday his race could well have gone "pop" rather than fizz.
