Tour Down Under stage 2 live coverage

Welcome to Cyclingnews' live coverage of stage 2 of the Tour Down Under, a 154.8km stage around Tanunda. The stage starts at 11:30am local time or 2:00am CET and 8pm EST and finishes roughly four hours later.

The stage is in the neutral zone at the moment. There are mild start conditions today in Brighton, with sailboats out in the water taking advantage of the wind. At the moment the wind speed isn't too brisk, but we will see if that picks later in the stage. 

The crowds in Brighton are getting bigger and bigger with all the high vantage points along today's route in obvious demand. 

Race director Stuart O'Grady has his head out of the lead car and is about to drop the flag to kick off stage 2 - the longest of this year's edition. 

And we're officially underway for stage 2 of Santos Tour Down Under. There's a leg-sapping unclassified climb to start, which average six percent. 

How appropriate to see some beautiful sand art along the coastal route of today's stage. The peloton is riding steady at the moment, no one is excited about attacking on this first steep climb out of Brighton.  

149km to go

It's a somewhat restrained start to today's stage. The first intermediate sprint comes at KM 33.6 through Snapper Point. 

We're inside the final 140km and things are cruising along at a fairly pedestrian pace at this point. It's another mild day with temperatures sitting at 20 degrees. 

Australian Luke Plapp (INEOS Grenadiers) is wearing the polka dot jersey today as the leader of the mountain competition. 

No one team is leading the peloton at the moment. It's still early on in the stage and the riders are still taking it easy. 

But it's quite breezy out there, which is likely a reason the peloton is more subdued. 

Now we're starting to see a little bit of action from the EF Education First EasyPost team. They're coming to the front as we head to the first intermediate sprint. 

We're within a few kilometres of the first intermediate sprint and EF have started lighting it up. 

Jayco-Alula is challenging the EF team to get Matthew up in position to steal a few more seconds.

But it's Marc Brustenga (Trek Segafredo) who takes the max points. It's a photo finish between second and third.

116km to go

Full results of the first sprint:

1. Marc Brustenga - 3pts

2. Hugo Page - 2 pts

3. Michael Matthews - 1 pt

After the first intermediate sprint, two riders have escaped up the road with 155km to go. It's Manuele Boaro and Johan Jacobs who are given quite a large gap already. 

The gap to Boaro and Jacobs is more than four minutes now with 108km to go. 

A single rider from Bahrain Victorious has come up to help. It's Hermann Pernsteiner who's doing a turn on the front. 

The gap is holding at 3'45" with the peloton not willing to let the duo up the road have any more time. 

100 km to go

The UAE team is doing some damage in the crosswinds! Echelons have started and the peloton is splintering.

The peloton is split into three small groups along the road and speeds are high. So high the leaders' advantage has dropped to 3'35". 

The gap between the first and second bunch is over a minute now, with many of the favourites making it into the first group. 

90km to go

Boaro is the lone rider on the road now, but the peloton is about to catch him. Or should we say the first group on the road, which has about 36 riders. 

The first group is approaching the second intermediate sprint. 

The officials are beckoning for the team cars to move out of the gap, which means the groups could merge back together soon. 

Israel is leading it out with Matthews in third place. Impey and Strong are up there.

Corbin Strong gets the three seconds on the line, and Matthews takes 2. Race leader Alberto Bettiol isn't going anywhere and takes third for 1 second. 

It's all back together after the feed zone. There's 78km to go in the longest stage of the tour. 

Another Astana rider is taking a turn off the front. It's Dmitriy Gruzdev who has a handful of seconds. 

Caleb Ewan rides with a Australian National Team member during stage 2 of the Tour Down Under. Can he pull off a win today after yesterday's disappointment? We'll find out in 70km. 

70km to go

We're on the approach to the KOM point on Parawa Hill (Cat. 2). We're less than 1.3km away from the top. 

And, not surprisingly, Dmitriy Gruzdev (Astana) takes the top points at the top of Parawa Hill. 

And Alessandro Cove (UAE) takes second over the top and current KOM leader Lucas Plapp took third. 

With 65km to go, the peloton has the solo leader in its sights. It won't be long now before Gruzdev is brought back.

The peloton is looking nervous in anticipation of what's ahead with 57km to go. 

The peloton is starting to increase the pace, but it's not totally full gas yet. It's the calm before the storm. 

There are quite a few teams leading the peloton at the moment. The pack is spread tightly across the road. 

Nans Peters, Damien Touze and Dorian Godon (AG2R Citröen Team) at the front of the peloton. 

At the start of the race, Cyclingnews spoke to AusCycling Endurance Head Coach Gene Bates who is part of the team looking after the Australian National Squad. When asked if the climbs near the end of the day could make it a little more selective at the finale he said:

"I think that there's potential there. I'm sure they've designed the course for that reason, that it could fall either way. There are some narrow sections, a lot of dodgy little roads, plus that climb has the potential to really split things up. We are quietly confident that there's enough time for it to come back together, Caleb is obviously in super shape, arguably the fastest guy in the race at the moment, so we would be keen to support him in trying to go after the stage win."

Jayco Alula and Bahrain Victorious have been active at the front of the peloton the majority of the stage. 

The peloton is approaching 40km to go and on the outskirts of Victor Harbour. 

The wind has picked up, with reported gusts of up to 40kph. It's going to a blustery finale for stage 2. 

The peloton has ridden together for the majority of this race, with a few breakaways, but it looks to remain solidly together as they head to Victor Harbour. 

We're less than 8km away from the base of the final climb of the day up Nettle Hill. 

The nervousness of the bunch is evident after a touch of wheels just brings down a handful of riders. They're all up and riding again. 

The tension is high as they get closer to the base of this climb. Position is everything.

The bunch will soon be on the Cat. 1 climb. It's an average of 6.8 percent and a max of 15.5 percent. Still all together with 4km to the base.

There's a fresh breeze at Victor Harbor, with Bureau of Meteorology saying the wind speed is at 35km/h.

The peloton is approaching the 20km to go point and the bottom of the final climb. 

Michael Matthews (Jayco Alula) has to get a new bike after a chain issue, which is not good news for the GC contender. 

Covi is the first to attack on the climb, Simon Yates responds and draws the peloton out. 

Jay Vine rides up to Yates and Rohan Dennis also responds. Michael Matthews is now a minute behind the front bunch. This could be the end of his bid for the ochre. 

The 5 leaders are already over the KOM, while Matthews has just now reached the top. 

The Ag2R team is at the front of the peloton and leading the chase for Ben O'Connor. 

So it's Dennis, Vine, Schmid, Yates and Hindley off the front of the bunch with a gap of about 20 seconds. 

Simon Yates has opted to sit at the back of this break. The other four are trading pulls. 

10km to go

And it looks like Alberto Bettiol has had a cramp in his right leg and is in a lot of pain. He's come to a complete standstill.

The five leaders are still charging away off the front with less than 10km to go. 

The updated gap to the breakaway is 45 seconds to the peloton. Ineos is chasing with Luke Plapp at the front.

The peloton is taking the five up the road very seriously and are committed to pulling this back. The gap is down to 30 seconds. 

We're approaching 5km to go and the gap is at 20 seconds. Yates is still sitting on the back of the break. 

The peloton is breathing down the break's neck with 4km to go. It's so close and Yates is now working with the group.

3km to go

This is going to be a close one. Just a handful of seconds separate the break from the peloton with 2.5km to go. 

Hindley makes a little move off the front, but Schmid tracks him down.

But now Dennis attacks!

Rohan Dennis (Jumbo Visma) takes the win! 

Rohan Dennis will also take the ochre jersey by one second. 

Rohan Dennis (Jumbo Visma) after winning stage 2 and taking the leaders jersey:

"That was a lot of work for a few seconds in GC. I just battled over the climb to get across to Jai Hindley and Simon Yates. From there it was just a battle and I was hoping Yatesy wouldn’t attack because he had sat on before helping us in the final five kilometres.

"I didn’t expect to go to the line. I thought it’d be hard over the climb and it’s a tricky run-in too, so hard for teams to control it. So all’s well that ended well."

~ Rohan Dennis (Ineos Grenadiers)

"This was the first WorldTour race I did. It really did help me get into the pro ranks and has helped a lot of young Aussie riders do the same, so we’ve got a lot to give back to this race. I’m really proud to wear the ochre jersey tomorrow."