Over a decade has passed since Eddie Dunbar was ripping it up as a junior on home roads riding for his local club, O’Leary Stone Kanturk.
He attacked off the front solo so frequently to win, often by huge margins, he was immediately spoken of as a future pro rider and potential stage winner – even overall winner – at the Tour de France.
Now aged 28 years, Dunbar has finally made his Tour de France debut today for Team Jayco AlUla. That debut has come much later than expected due to largely wasted years at Ineos/Sky where he simply couldn’t get a Tour start.
Back in 2014, such was the hype around Dunbar that bookies were offering odds on him to win the Tour, or a stage at the race. Stickybottle covered it at the time, as we were reminded today by ‘The Brain of Cycling’, Cillian Kelly.
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In 2014 Paddy Power was offering odds on Dunbar as follows:
- Eddie Dunbar to win a Tour de France stage at any time of his career 13/8
- Eddie Dunbar to win a Tour de France stage up to 2025 included 3/1
- Eddie Dunbar to win the Tour de France General Classification Outright at any time of his career 50/1
- Eddie Dunbar to win the Tour de France General Classification Outright up to 2025 included 150/1
Those odds were being offered in the autumn of 2014, as Dunbar was wrapping up his two years as a junior and signing for UK-based Continental team, NFTO.
But now that ‘Fast Eddie’ is all grown up, and has actually made it into the Tour, the odds on success in France over the next three weeks are not so generous – no surprise from the gambling industry!
The only Paddy Power bet would could find for Dunbar was for both the Cork rider and compatriot Ben Healy to win a stage on this year's race, with odds of 13/2 offered.
Overall – across a large number of bookmakers – Dunbar’s odds of winning the Tour de France outright were between 300/1 and 600/1 and with 500/1 the most commonly offered odds across the board.
