This morning, Team Sky awoke to a nasty surprise, as 16 of the team's bikes had been stolen from the support vehicle. However, replacements could be found, and the team was able to ride stage 1 of the Tour du Haut-Var almost as planned.

Team Sky race coach Shaun Stephens explained to the team website: “The thieves took all the bikes, bar two, and we presume they only left those because they’d run out of space in whatever transport they were using. They also took some of the spare training wheels, and various bits of other equipment.”

Thankfully, the British team runs a training house in Nice, about an hour away from the hotel the team was staying at ahead of the Tour du Haut-Var, and could source replacement bikes from there.

Nevertheless, Team Sky was still one bike short – but another team helped out: “The remaining bike we’ve been able to borrow from the Bretagne-Séché Environnement team, who we’ve been sharing our hotel with,” continued Stephens. “That was a really nice gesture from them and we appreciate it a lot. Things like that really show the spirit of cycling and we can’t thank them enough.

“Racing so close to Nice, it's almost the best of a bad situation, because if it had been anywhere else in the world we’d have been in real trouble and probably not been able to take part. Fortunately we had a lot of spare equipment there so we should be OK to continue without the need for any further replacements.”

Nathan Earle finished the stage in 11th place, 6 seconds behind winner Carlos Betancur.