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Tour of Britain 2018: Stage 5

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 Hello and welcome to live coverage of stage 5 of the 2018 Tour of Britain. Today we have a first for the modern race – a team time trial.

Today's stage is 14km long and finishes with a climb up Whinlatter Pass, which will feature twice on tomorrow's stage, the second time as a summit finish.

Here are today's start times (UK time):

And here are the GC standings and jersey wearers at the start of today's stage. We're expecting a GC shakeup, though race leader Patrick Bevin's BMC team is among the favourite to take the TTT win.

Yesterday we saw André Greipel (Lotto-Soudal) take his second victory of the race. The German got a great run out of the final corner in Leamington Spa before sprinting out of the wheel of Patrick Bevin (BMC) to win with Sacha Modolo (EF-Drapac) in his wake. Bevin also extended his GC lead thanks to the bonus seconds he picked up by finishing third.

Just a couple of minutes remain until JLT-Condor leave the starting ramp.

And they're off. JLT-Condor are out on course now.

All but one of the JLT-Condor men are on TT bikes. Graham Briggs is the sole exception. A curious choice.

Each squad sets off at three-minute intervals today. All but five teams have their full complement of riders.

And now Canyon-Eisberg are off. Once again, they're on a mixture of TT and road bikes. It'll be interesting to see what bikes the big favourites for the win will be riding.

Madison-Genesis are off now. Their rider Matthew Holmes is the leader of the intermediate sprints competition, having dominated the breakaway during yesterday's stage.

Each team's time will be taken at the fourth rider to cross the finish line, by the way.

Meanwhile, Canyon-Eisberg have lost a rider after six minutes of racing. Alex Paton, who was in the break yesterday, dropped back on a rise in the road.

One Pro Cycling are just rolling down the ramp now. Their rider Hayden McCormick was in the break yesterday, and the entire team are on time trial bikes.

Bardiani-CSF are the next team off. Alessandro Tonelli was in the break of the day on stage two, finishing second to Cameron Meyer (Mitchelton-Scott) and taking the leader's green jersey for a day.

There is an intermediate checkpoint at 7km, but we haven't seen any times come through on tv, Twitter or the race website, so that seems pretty pointless.

Team Wiggins follow Team Sunweb down the start ramp. Both teams have five riders remaining and both teams are running full time trial rigs.

JLT-Condor are the first team through the finish. Their time is 21:50.9.

Some news from Team Sky as Chris Froome and Geraint Thomas, both racing here in Britain at the moment, will miss the World Championships due to fatigue.

Great Britain are the fastest at the intermediate checkpoint, with a time of 8:58, nine seconds faster than the fastest team so far, Canyon-Eisberg.

Gaps are emerging in the Great Britain train as they head into the final 400 metres. Their third and fourth men are falling back.

Ethan Hayter powers across the line, seemingly not noticing what has happened behind. Still, they go fastest by 25 seconds with a time of 20:55.4.

The 11th team of the day set off. Dimension Data are underway.

Team Sunweb have now set the fastest time at the checkpoint, six seconds faster than Great Britain.

One Pro Cycling cross the line in second. Team Wiggins are the final British domestic team out on course.

Bardiani-CSF and Team Sunweb will be next across the line.

Team Sky set off. They're among the favourites for victory today.

Bardiani-CSF cross the line. Their time is 21:40.4.

20:42.4 for Team Sunweb, the new fastest time.

A fractured Team Wiggins finish with a time of 21:01.7.

Direct Énergie and EF-Drapac will be the next teams to cross the line.

At the other end of the course Quick Step Floors are just about to depart. The last team off will be BMC in around ten minutes.

Both Quick Step Floors and BMC are among the favourites for the stage win today. The other big favourite, Team Sky, are out on course, while LottoNL-Jumbo will be off soon.

Chris Froome drops off the back of the Team Sky paceline. They're on the climb now, 14 minutes into their ride.

Direct Énergie have already finished but we don't have their time yet, unfortunately.

Dimension Data cross the line with four men together. Their time is 20:58.8.

Iljo Keisse is the first man to drop from Quick Step Floors. He has put in a few huge rides so far, slogging away for hours at the front of the peloton on a number of stages.

Łukasz Wiśniowski drops off the Sky train. They have four men left – Stannard, Poels, Thomas and Kiryienka.

Sky ride into the final kilometre. Kiryienka is hanging on by a thread.

Movistar are off, the penultimate team to start the stage. They are, shockingly enough, leading the team classification and are wearing the gree

Team Sky cross the line, setting the fastest time of the day by some margin. Their time is 20:03.0.

Mitchelton-Scott have had a good ride. They cross the line second-quickest so far with a time of 20:31.3.

It looks like Quick Step Floors and BMC will be the only teams to have a chance of beating that time from Team Sky. The Belgian will find it tough going though, with two riders dropping back early on.

Wow, Katusha-Alpecin have beaten Team Sky! 19:57.0 for Martin, Dowsett, Strakhov and Würtz Schmidt.

Wanty-Groupe Gobert cross the line with three men. Their fourth man crosses the line in 20:58

Quick Step Floors are coming up to the line now. The remaining four are splitting up as Schachmann and Jungels power onwards. Alaphilippe is trying to bring Richeze back.

And Quick Step go fastest! Despite losing two men pretty early on they set a time of 19:53.2.

Primož Roglič is driving LottoNL-Jumbo in the final killometre.

Looks like it'll be close at the top the way LottoNL-Jumbo are going.

Or maybe not that close... The Dutch team go fastest by a wide margin, setting a time of 19:36.7.

BMC are down to four men. They're 15 minutes into their ride, so they'll be crossing the line in 4-5 minutes.

Movistar cross the line with a time of 20:12.9, fifth fastest so far. Just BMC left now.

BMC have race leader Patrick Bevin, Stefan Küng, Jürgen Roelandts and Tejay Van Garderen left as they head into the final kilometre. Küng is really struggling and is distanced by his teammates.

Bevin, Roelandts and Van Garderen slow up so Küng can catch back on. They need all four men together at the finish.

LottoNL-Jumbo have won stage 5 of the Tour of Britain!

Surprisingly poor ride from BMC. They cross the line with a time of 20:17.2.

Time to get the calculators out to work out the new GC standings, then.

Stage 5 result:

GC after stage 5:

It's been an amazing year for Roglič, who only started cycling six years ago. July saw him finish fourth at the Tour de France. while earlier in the year he has won Itzulia, the Tour de Romandie and his home race the Tour of Slovenia.

Here are the day's victors on the podium, courtesy of LottoNL-Jumbo's Twitter feed.

Lying second overall, Julian Alaphilippe has also enjoyed an annus mirabilis this year, winning La Flèche Wallonne, two Tour de France stages, the polka dot jersey and Clásica San Sebastián, among others.

Here's a look at tomorrow's stage. It's the queen stage of the race, taking in 168.3km around the Lake District. Four first category climbs dot the route, along with several more tough uncategorised hills.

And that's it from me for today. Come back tomorrow for live coverage of stage 6!

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