January 24, Stage 3: Unley - Stirling 139km

What Stuart O'Grady says...

We start with Mount Barker and it's a pretty nasty way to start any day. It's a solid climb. I start my training up there everyday. It's going to put the squeeze on a lot of guys, especially after the first couple of stages. We go up the main road and then turn off onto the old highway [Mount Barker Road]. That could hurt a lot of legs but it will depend on whether the peloton want to race that early.

It's a touch circuit around Sterling and it seems like every year we are doing more and more laps. This year we have five [after coming through the finish line the first time]. Three was already extremely hard and five is just going to be very, very difficult.

For me, Corkscrew on Stage 2 is going to be selective and this day is going to be quite decisive. There's no where to recover. It's like a world championship circuit and the pace is going to get quicker and quicker every lap. We'll see coming into the finish with the final five kilometres, probably not a huge group, maybe 30 or 40 guys.

It may not be the most decisive day of the tour but you could really inflict some damage.

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