Tour De France, 2007, Stage 3 Preview: The Longest Day in the Saddle

Perhaps with some rare exceptions in the pre-World War I years, the longest stage of the Tour de France is never the most difficult.

Still, the designation holds some status and it will occur early in the Tour this year, stage 3 on Tuesday.

Beginning in Waragem, Belgium, a city more well-known for its equestrian competitions than cycling, the field will ride 236.5 kilometers (146.9 miles) to Compiegne, France. The journey will take more than six hours, and it will include three time bonus sprints and a blip of a category 4 climb in the final 20 miles.

Plenty will likely happen before then, attacks and counter attacks team maneuvering. The cyclists will progress through many of the small villages now famous as passing points in cycling's Hell of the North, the April one-day race Paris-Roubaix.

A short trek into the stage, the peloton will return to France and pass through dozens of French "postcard" villages, including Fontaine-au-Bois. It's the hometown of former Tour race director Jean-Marie LeBlanc.

Like the second stage, Tuesday's finish takes the riders to a famous city, but not by Tour standards. Compiegne is where the Armistice to end WW I was signed. It's also the location of a renowned Napoleanic palace the riders will pass while negotiating cobblestones. And it's also the city in which aforementioned Paris-Roubaix begins.

As for the Tour, a stage has only once previously ended in Compiegne. In 1980, the year of Dutchman Joop Zoetemelk's only race title, the sixth stage advanced from Lille to Compiegne. Frenchman Jean-Louis Gauthier escaped from a five-rider group and pedaled to a 39-second solo win.

It was Zoetemelk's year, though. He rode to nearly a seven-minute overall title over compatriot Hennie Kuiper. Zoetemelk, who retired in 1986, also finished second in the Tour six times. His career 16 Tour finishers are the most in history, and Zoetemelk is considered as among the top-10 riders in Tour history.

What will occur in Tuesday's stage 3 is, of course, why there are bicycle races - the unknown is the only certainty.

Will there be a long, sustained breakaway? Will the field shatter after a massive crash? Or, will the peloton arrive intact and another massive sprint develop with the designated blistering quick piston-turners again at the front.

If the latter occurs, it's riders like Robbie McEwen (Predictor-Lotto) of Australia, Thor Hushovd (Credit Agricole) of Norway and Tom Boonen (Quick-Step-Innergetic) who will likely again emerge.