Ben Healy loses three minutes to set up Tour de France attacks

Jonas Vingegaard's Visma Lease a Bike won the stage 1 TTT in Barcelona and is back in Tour yellow for the first time in three years (Photo: Thomas Maheux)

Jonas Vingegaard's Visma Lease a Bike won the stage 1 TTT in Barcelona and the Dane is back in the Tour de France yellow jersey for the first time in three years.

Though this three-week race has only just begun - and Vingegaard lost his biggest asset, Wout van Aert, before it started - he has landed the first blow against the man to beat, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), now leading him by 13 seconds.

The home favourite, teenager Paul Seixas, saw his Decathlon CMA CGM Team finish 6th and he has already given away 39 seconds to Vingegaard.

Tadej Pogačar's team fell behind Visma Lease a Bike and he could not make up the time on the final climb before the finish (Photo: Thomas Maheux)

Ireland's only rider in the race, Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) is not riding general classification on this race and lost three minutes today.

That time loss will mean Healy gets plenty of leeway, from the start of this race, to get up the road and hunt for stage wins.

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Healy won a stage and held the race lead for two days last year. And after a stop-start season so far in 2026, with injury and illness, he sounded determined on the eve of the race, and confident he could aim for a stage win or even two.

Today, Netcompany Ineos were in the hot seat for the longest time, holding off nearest challengers, Lidl-Trek, by eight seconds over the 19.6km course.

However, that was before Visma Lease a Bike blasted around the course, and Vingegaard then sprung from the line to attack the final climb, and push the British team into 2nd place, by eight seconds.

Remco Evenepoel's Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe could only manage 5th, though the Belgian has only lost 19 seconds (Photo: Charly López)

The only question mark after that point was whether Pogačar's team could take the stage victory. They trailed Visma Lease a Bike by 13 seconds at the time checks.

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That meant their hopes were all pinned on Pogačar being able to claw that back when he pressed on solo on the final climbs.

In the end, he made very few inroads, with his time ultimately 12 seconds down on Vingegaard. That forced Pogačar's team into 3rd place on the day, as it also trailed Netcompany-Ineos by eight seconds.

The best-placed rider from Healy's team was recent Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes (2.UWT) stage winner and yellow jersey, Alex Baudin. The French rider's time of 22:44 was 57 seconds down on the day, enough for 11th place for the team.

Healy was one of those who let go early, ensuring he relinquished 3:11, which now puts him in 84th position overall.

That suits Healy, who said he will continue to race as he always has - going in the breakaways and attacking solo from them.

And his time loss today means, if he chooses, he may get come rope as early as tomorrow, with its hilly finale.

The opening road race stage takes the riders 168.5km from Tarragona to Barcelona, with just over 2,000m of elevation gain, including a cat 3 just before the finish.

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