Tour Stage 5: Wet, Cold and Bumpy

The peloton may have avoided the traditional rainy days of England, but it caught up with them on the roads of Belgium.  Stage 5 offered up the same roads as the fabled Spring Classic, Paris Roubaix, the only bright side of the rain was that it force ASO (the race organizers) to remove to sections of pave.  The sections were underwater, not exactly ideal racing conditions.  Marcus Burghardt (BMC), Tony Martin, (OPQS), Rein Taaramae (Cofidis), Simon Clarke and Matthew Hayman (both Orica-GreenEdge) were some of the nine guys who got away from the opening kilometers of the stage.  With the uneven cobbles of northern France and Belgium facing the racers, I think they were eager to be done as soon as possible.  This is an original small watercolor and ink painting that was created using Yarka St. Petersburg watercolors and Steve Quiller brushes from www.richesonart.com.  This painting is available through my artist website at www.greigleach.com and will be included in my soon to be self published pictorial story of the Tour, "Book de Tour"  To learn more about the book project, to pre-order your copy or to learn how you can be involved in bring this race to print please visit my kickstarter campaign at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1335072134/book-de-tour  If you would like to purchase this particular painting, just follow the direct link at the end of this post.

http://www.greigleach.com/large-view/Tour%20de%20France%202014/2399198-31-30-199992/Painting/Sports.html#.U72YJsvD_IU