On yer bike! Today The Prologue came to town! And on a course beginning at Whitehall the riders in the Tour completed a 7.9km circuit with the finish line in the Mall. I alighted at Victoria and as you can see had my hat on! London was smiling today.
London Loves! The sun shine and the people - Ken Livingstone seemed to have this weekend licked. 
The start point in Whitehall - check out the rider in white helmet getting ready to go down the ramp to start his circuit. I wandered round to Trafalgar Square and watched on the screens until I realised you got to see the riders warming up at the top end of Whitehall! Bonus - so after failing to get any action shots I finally did! 
The dark moody form of ?! - who knows - but let's face it with all those very fit athletes on their bicycles and wearing their shorts it was indeed an opportunity not to be wasted by one so young! And this dark and moody chap is quite yummy! The various sponsors for the race include my home county and the infamous Medway Towns!
Trying to take photos of moving cyclists is tricky - they go VERY fast - so as you can see - you either get their back up car or hands of others obscuring them! I did eventually find some top spots on the way back up Victoria Street and managed to get some sense of the Tour in London.
It was a really excited feeling - the crowds were from all over the world and the city had managed to adopt a French air about it. Well the pushing in at least! The voices were many - and no-one seemed to be worried about the events of last weekend or indeed 2 years previous. This was a rare opportunity to see the most gruelling cycle race in our neck of the woods.
I was generally excited cos even as a kid one of my abiding memories of summer holidays (apart from test cricket on the BBC and 4 yearly World Cups) is sitting with my brother after a hard day of picking fruit and watching the Tour de France highlights. Now the Tour is on ITV4 - the whole stage live on TV - not just puny highlights! Gary Imlach and Phil Leggett are still commentating and the race still inspires the closet cyclist in me! Tomorrow it heads to Stage 1 - through the lanes and y ways of Kent - which makes me immensely proud and draws together so many emotions - cycling to and fro between fruit fields during the summer - Stu & I doing of King of the Mountains up Stockers Hill. He always won the yellow the green and the polka dot jersey's... typical. But today was about London - and revitalising the Tour.
I think both benefited.
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