There are 38 riders, given the withdrawals of Nibali and Porte. The course has a 24.8km loop that is done twice, with a 2.5km run in/out.
So how are they managing this in terms of start times? Will there be 19 no-hopers first, with all of these completing their second laps before the favourites start at all, or will they allow some to be starting lap 1 as others start lap 2? I suppose a more radical solution might be to have riders starting at 30 second intervals; that way they could have constant starts, but avoid riders on different laps alongside each other.
In short, I suppose I'm asking if the start times have been released?
The UCI site still describes cobbles on each lap: that is definitely out of date, yes?