Tour Down Under Prologue LIVE: Time Trial Specialists Battle for Leader's Jersey

Refresh A key weather update via Simone Guiliani on the ground: "Far from dropping off, the wind seems to be picking up, blowing fiercely at the Victoria Park finish line, causing spectators to hold onto their hats and sending the flags furiously flapping." The provisional top five - Sam Watson leads As things seemed to have calmed down after that early flurry of top times, here's where we're currently at at the head of the rankings: 1. Sam Watson (Ineos Grenadiers) 4:16.9 2. Ethan Vernon (NSN) at 0.59 sec 3. Laurence Pithie (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) at 2.7 sec 4. Finn Fisher-Black (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) at 6 sec 5. Michael Leonard (EF Education-Easy Post) at 7 sec Yet more reading material should you need it: colleague Matilda Price has written the Cyclingnews' breakdown of who the big GC contenders will likely be in this year's Santos Tour Down Under. Here's the link: Home riders among favourites in open GC field – Analysing the Tour Down Under contenders And let's not forget, racing has already been happening already, not just the Nationals. The Women's Tour Down Under finished less than 48 hours ago. You can read our full report here: Women's Tour Down Under: Noemi Rüegg outsprints UAE Team ADQ rivals to win stage 3 and claim overall for second year in a row And here's an image of Sam Watson during his ride to the provisional top spot overall: will it be enough to take the first lead of the race? Vine has recently claimed the Australian National TT title for a second time in his career, and even if the course is - as he said earlier today - one for the track specialists than pure road time triallers, interest will be very high in what he can achieve. You can read about his victory in Perth, on the other side of Australia, here: Jay Vine reclaims elite men's time trial title at the Australian Road National Championships Riders are off at minute intervals all the way to last starter Jay Vine (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) at 20:19 local time. Back to the present, there are two checkpoints in the course, at km 1 and km2, prior to the finish at km 3.6. Luke Durbridge (Jayco-AlUla) finishes. A long, long time ago in a country far, far away, 'Turbo Durbo' won a very similar short opening prologue in the Critérium du Dauphiné, beating no less a time trial star than Bradley Wiggins. For those looking to dust down the history books, here's our report: Durbridge wins Criterium du Dauphine prologue in Grenoble And that in turn is superceded by Sam Watson (Ineos Grenadiers) with a fastest time of 4:16.9. Just a couple of seconds faster, but it puts the Briton into the hot seat. That was a good start to the year for Leonard in his first ever race with new team EF, but he's already been overhauled by New Zealand's Laurence Pithie (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) with a time of 4:19, nearly five seconds faster. And as if by magic, they appear. Fastest time currently for Michael Leonard of 4:24. He's got a hefty (by 3.2 kilometre prologue standards) advantage of 2.3 kilometres on Marco Brenner (Tudor). No clear indication yet of times, but we'll bring them as soon as we've got something vaguely official. More background from Simone Giuliani on the ground about the atmosphere out there in Adelaide: "Crowds are starting to pack the roadside around the start area with riders sheltering from the sun under marquees before they line up, wearing ice vests given it’s still warm despite the late start. Though with it being just a hop skip and jump from the village and their accomodation they don’t have to worry about setting out too far in advance." Gogl powers home, the first rider across the line. But a time trialing specialist like Canadian TT champion Michael Leonard (EF Education-EasyPost) is out there on the course, and he's likely to set a very good time, too. And Gogl is off, the Tour Down Under is officially underway. Critically, it's mostly flat. As for the course, here's what the riders can expect: some technical bits, basically and some bits to get a good turn of speed on: "The prologue starts near the Tour village with a straight stretch down Wakefield Street before a right turn into East terrace after 1.1km and then another left, right and then left hand turn in quick succession before a sharp left and two hairpin turns before riders can complete the run through to the finish line at Victoria Park." If you're wondering, the last time there was a prologue in the Tour Down Under was back in 2023, also in Adelaide. That was almost twice the length though, 5.5 kilometres, with the win going to Italy's Alberto Bettiol. You can read the CN report about that here. Alberto Bettiol wins a wet prologue at the Tour Down Under First rider down the start ramp in Adelaide will be Austria's Michael Gogl (Alpecin-Premier Tech) "The winds should ease through the evening with the current gust speed of 26 knots expected to drop to around 18 knots by the time Jay Vine, the last rider out, is heading to the line." Current weather conditions are, according to CN's reporter on the ground Simone Giuliani, as follows: "It may be stretching into the evening in Adelaide but the sun still has a sting in it and the temperature is sitting around 30 degrees Celsius. Currently there are also gusty bursts of wind blowing across the course." That said, this is the first day of racing in the 2026 elite men's WorldTour, so anticipation is high as the men's season gets underway. The course is just 3.6 kilometres long, meaning this is very much a short, fast effort which will produce a first leader, but long term it'll likely have little effect on GC. Hello and welcome to the live coverage of the prologue of the Santos Tour Down Under in Adelaide