Nothing to get too worried about but another bit of bad luck for Richie Porte has he suffers a mechanical and has to get his rear wheel changed.

The Australian is back among the team cars quickly enough and chasing back on.

Matt Taggart: Well, the swimming pool was so busy there were queues backed up into the car park, so I guess I have no other option but to watch the build up to Cav's 31st win... (fingers crossed)

Just had another shot of Lawson Craddock, who is hanging on to the rear of the peloton, despite his broken shoulder blade.

The Texan tweeted earlier that he will donate $100 for every stage he finishes to his local Alkek Velodrome in Houston, which was flooded during Hurricane Harvey last year.

Even making it through today would be a supreme effort.

Another gorgeous day in the Vendee, the official website stating the current temperature is 31 degrees. It's 'only' 27 degrees here in Salford. Touche, France.

Sylvain Chavanel is still out front alone, with an advantage of 2'45'' - he's just had a long chat with his team director in the Direct Energie car.

"Tough luck, Sylvain. This is going to really hurt now."

Dion Smith, the other breakaway rider to bail out after Michael Gogl, is finally caught by the peloton behind.

The peloton, led by Quick-Step to protect the yellow jersey Fernando Gaviria, swallow up Michael Gogl.

Dion Smith will be next.

I wonder if Sylvain Chavanel muttered a couple of swear words under his breath when he saw his those two sit up. He's got up to almost 150km of solo struggle now.

Dion Smith has now sat up, leaving Sylvain Chavanel out by himself.

It seems like the Kiwi was just looking for that KOM point and, now he's got it, he's happy to sit and wait for his team to catch up.

No sign of Michael Gogl either.

So that leaves 39-year-old Frenchman Chavanel, riding a record 18th Tour de France, out front by himself.

"Allez!" cry the French fans by the side of the road. He has a gap of 2'26'' with 148km to go.

Sylvain Chavanel and Dion Smith are still out front, but Michael Gogl has just dropped back for a bit to fetch something from his team car.

They have a lead of just under three minutes to the peloton.

Lawson Craddock is still battling on the back, riding with a broken shoulder blade after a crash yesterday.

His Education First team director Jonathan Vaughters is hopeful the Texan will be able to finish today and go from there.

Sylvain Chavanel would've coasted that back in the day but the 39-year-old Frenchman has to cede to his two younger breakaway pals.

And it's Dion Smith who comes past Michael Gogl to take the summit and win the single king of the mountains point on offer.

That makes him tied with Kevin Ledanois on one point in the polka dot jersey competition. Who wears it tomorrow will come down to who is higher on GC at the end of the stage.

Smith is currently just over three minutes in front of Ledanois on GC.

The leading trio are onto the sole climb of the day - the category four Cote de Pouzauges.

Who fancies the sole king of the mountains point available for the first rider over the top?

Chavanel, Smith and Gogl are duking it out...

Hmm, Mark Cavendish didn't sound too confident about his prospects there. But will today's run-in suit him any better?

Here are the last 2km of stage two, courtesy of our commentary team out in France...

Mark Cavendish, speaking on ITV 4 about stage one: "I don't know what happened, we just lost each other. The winds didn't do much but it caused a bit of chaos and we were on the wrong end of that chaos.

"In the last I kilometre I was too far back to try anything. We're going to be hard pushed to beat Bora and Quick-Step this year.

"You'll see next year but they'll be hard to beat this year."

This is not the only bicycle race going on today - the fourth Velothon of Wales is taking place, with more than 10,000 hardy souls taking to the roads of South Wales.

Have you been taking part this morning, with your family cheering you on - as pictured below? Or have you been out on your regular Sunday morning club ride? It's a beautiful day out there so we're sure you've got some lovely pictures to share.

It's going to be a long afternoon in the saddle before we get to the finish line in France, so keep us entertained. #bbccycling, external

Image source, Bethan Gregg

Rob Hayles
Ex-GB cyclist on BBC Radio 5 live, in France

Chris Froome has to go on the offensive and we know that he is one of those riders who is not shy to go on the offensive. They will have to seek more opportunities to take that time back. But at least from day one they know that time deficit. It’s not ideal but others have lost too.

Listen to more from Rob on BBC Sport's daily BeSpoke Cycling podcast.

The leading trio of Sylvain Chavanel, Dion Smith and Michael Gogl are still out front, with an advantage of two minutes 23 seconds.

They cruise past a man wearing a Vendee region cycling jersey and cap while hammering away on an out of tune electric guitar. Because why not?

Vive la Tour.

Barring more accidents or crosswinds that cause splits today, Froome won't be taking that time back today.

Team Sky can look to cut into the deficit on Monday's team time trial though, as will Richie Porte's BMC squad.

So while that 51-second loss is significant, it could've been much worse.

With all the crashes in the final 10km of yesterday's stage one, there were four major GC contenders who were caught out.

Chris Froome, Richie Porte and Adam Yates all crashed or were caught behind crashes and rolled in 51 seconds down on their other rivals in the main group.

Nairo Quintana was the big loser though, wrecking his wheels after colliding with a traffic island and eventually rolling in 24 further seconds down on the Froome group.

Romain Bardet, Tom Dumoulin, Mikel Landa, Vincenzo Nibali, Geraint Thomas, Rigoberto Uran and Alejandro Valverde were the main GC favourites to make it through unscathed.

Right, with the breakaway established and the peloton happy to just settle in for the day, let's have a quick recap of yesterday's stage.

You're forgiven for missing it, given a certain other sporting event that went on, but if you want to catch up - why not listen to our daily podcast, Bespoke at the Tour de France...

The leading trio of Chavanel, Smith and Gogl has extended their lead out to 1'21'' with 175km to go of stage two.