Fiona Mangan in 100km breakaway ride at Tour de France | Video

Fiona Mangan keeping an eye on world champion Lotte Kopecky in the breakaway on today's stage 7 at the Tour de France, where the Irish rider was up the road for almost 100km (Photo: Pauline Ballet)

Fiona Mangan (Winspace Orange Seal) told stickybottle in recent days her form on the Tour de France wasn't quite what she was hoping for, but that didn't stop her going on the attack on today's stage 7 to Chambery.

The Limerick rider had tried to go in the early attacks over the last couple of days but today was her day; going clear in a 17-rider move about 25km into the 159.7km stage. The first 100km or so were flat, before the riders faced three climbs in the shape of the Côte de Saint-France, Côte de Berland, and Col du Granier.

Before that lumpier terrain was tackled, the breakaway had combined well and pulled out a gap of five minutes on the pleoton, with Fenix-Deceuninck, Visma-Lease a Bike, and Liv AlUla Jayco comitting riders to the chase at the front of that bunch.

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In the move with Mangan were: Ruth Edwards (Human Powered Health), Lucinda Brand, Shirin van Anrooij (Lidl-Trek), Maeva Squiban (UAE Team ADQ), Alicia González (St Michel-Preference Home-Auber 93), Eline Jansen and Maud Rijnbeek (VolkerWessels), Justine Ghekiere (AG Insurance-Soudal), Megan Jastrab (Picnic-PostNL), Susanne Andersen (Uno-X Mobility), Chloé Dygert (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto), Marie Le Net (FDJ-Suez), Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime), Mareille Meijering (Movistar) and Célia Le Mouel (Ceratizit).

Maeva Squiban attacked Mareille Meijering on the final climb - after both had been in the breakaway - with the French rider going on to take her second win in as many days (Photo: Pauline Ballet)

When the leaders reached the Côte de Saint-Franc - 3.8km at 6.9 per cent - with about 55km to go, Mangan was still in the breakaway, which had the best part of five minutes. However, as the climb continued, the breakaway was trimmed.

Andersen and Gonzalez were distanced, then Brand and Mangan - followed by others - as SD Worx-Protime had taken up the pace-setting on the front of the peloton. On the Côte de Berland, the second of the day's three climbs, Rijnbeek went clear and she had built a gap of about 30 seconds by the time she raced onto the foot of the Col du Granier, the final climb.

Behind her, the original breakaway had split to pieces and a number of riders were making efforts, successful as it turned out, to bridge across to the lone leader. Meijering and Edwards bridged up befoe the final climb began. Behind, Squiban, Van Anrooij and Dygert pulled clear of the survivors from the breakaway, with the pelton now just under 2:30 back.

As the riders up front came together, some of them were soon on the attack again; Squiban and Meijering pushing it and going clear. And as the top of the climb approached, Squiban, yesterday's stage winner, attacked and got clear solo.

She raced down the descent and into the finish for another win; taking it ahead of Cédrine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly), who was not in the orginal breakaway. Kerbaol finished 51 seconds down, alongside breakaway rider Edwards, with van Anrooij in 4th just another couple of seconds back.

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The general classification group, sprinting for 5th, arrived at the finish exactly one minute after the winner. Dominika Włodarczyk (UAE Team ADQ) won the sprint, from yellow jersey Kim Le Court (AG Insurance - Soudal Team).

Le Court had been dropped on the final climb but fought back impressively on the descent to finish strongly in the 10-strong GC group.

After her breakaway heroics, which last for 99km, Mangan finished in 66th at 11:06. Mia Griffin (Roland Le Dévoluy) was 99th at 18:10 while Lara Gillespie (UAE Team ADQ) placed 123rd, some 22:23 down on her team mate winning for the second day in a row.

Le Court retains the race lead, by 26 seconds from Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Visma | Lease a Bike), with defending champion Katarzyna Niewiadoma (CANYON//SRAM zondacrypto) and 2023 GC winner Demi Vollering (FDJ SUEZ) 3rd and 4th at 30 and 31 seconds respectively.

Tomorrow's penultimate stage takes the riders 111.9km from Chambéry to the summit finish of Col de la Madeleine; the biggest stage finale of this year's Tour.

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