Derek Gee (Israel-Premier Tech) will be the last rider down the ramp on stage 4 of the 2024 Critérium du Dauphiné but all eyes will be on the earlier riders heading out for the 34.4-kilometre test from Saint-Germain-Laval to Neulise - namely World Champion Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-Quickstep) and Primož Roglič (Bora-Hansgrohe).
The two are expected to be the top contenders at the Tour de France along with defending champion Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) but both are coming back from injuries sustained in the mass crash at the Itzulia Basque Country in April.
The time trial will be a major indicator of where Evenepoel and Roglič are in there preparations for the Tour de France in addition to being the first step toward the overall victory in the Dauphiné.
Roglič is third overall at seven seconds behind the Canadian winner of stage 3, while Evenepoel is among a 38-rider group at 13 seconds and is sitting in 33rd.
The Belgian will start his time trial at 3:42 p.m. just before Vuelta a España winner Sepp Kuss (Visma-Lease a Bike).
Other riders to watch on the stage are Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers), who heads out onto the course at 1:49 p.m. and is the favourite to set the fastest early time.
Neilson Powless (EF Education-EasyPost) said on Monday that he has high ambitions for the Dauphiné and is focussed on the time trial.
"I would like to try my hand at GC, but we'll have to sort of make the decision if I'll have team support after the time trial, because it's still a bit of a unknown," he said to CyclingPro.net.
Powless suffered from a knee injury that kept him out of competition for much of the spring, but returned in time to race the US Pro Road National Championships. He's hoping to make the Olympic team and has been putting in time on his TT bike.
"I've gotten a lot more a lot more comfortable on my TT bike and I'm hopefully getting back to the level that I was at in my u-23 years of being a time trial focused rider. I sort of let it go for a while but now I'm trying to refocus on it."
His compatriot Sepp Kuss is also thinking about the overall classification, telling CyclingPro.net he's worked on the time trial bike, too.
"There are a lot of good riders here, we'll have to see how it is after the TT and then go to the mountain stages. I've worked a decent amount on the TT bike, just to have a good feel on the bike. It's a long TT and doing that kind of effort is good training."
