Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) has taken a huge step in his career, seizing the yellow jersey at the Tour de France just four days after he won stage 6 of the race with a solo attack in excess of 40km.
He is the first Irish rider to wear the Tour yellow jersey since Stephen Roche took it in 1987 on the way to winning the three-week race. Healy joins Roche, Sean Kelly and Shay Elliott as a member of the very exclusive club of Irish riders to wear Tour de France yellow, an incredible achievement.
After finishing in 3rd place today, Healy watched on in the finish area to see if he had gained the time he needed take yellow. But that anxious wait was rewarded as Bastille Day turned into the biggest day of Healy's life.
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In finishing 3rd today from the breakaway, Healy was 31 seconds down on stage winner Simon Yates (Visma Lease a Bike). Crucially, the man who held the yellow jersey today, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates - XRG), was back in 9th and 4:20 down on the Irishman.
That meant Healy jumped from 11th overall, at 3:55, this morning, and into the yellow jersey. He now leads Pogačar by 29 seconds. Healy has also taken the lead in the young riders' classification and he and Roche are the only Irish riders ever to hold that jersey. Healy has also moved up to 2nd place in the climbers' classification.
How Ben Healy took Tour de France yellow
Healy today again used a breakaway move to create another historic day for Irish cycling, and one that means his market value will soar in pro cycling.
He forged clear in a large 29-man breakaway very early on the stage, which took the riders 165km from Ennezat to Le Mont-Dore Puy de Sancy. Though it took the group the longest time to build their advantage to one minute, and then two, the peloton eventually gave them some leeway and their gap reached over six minutes at one point.
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With as much as 66km to go to the finish, the breakaway's advantage had reached 3:56 on the main peloton containing yellow jersey Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG). And that nudged Healy into the virual yellow jersey on the move.
Healy had his team mates Harry Sweeny, Alex Baudin and Neilson Powless, in the breakaway group with him and they stepped up to take on the pace-setting at the front. They knew from very early in the breakaway a yellow jersey was on the line as Healy was the best-placed of those in the initial large front group.
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Behind the leaders, the Visma-Lease a Bike team of Jonas Vingegaard threw in several attacks, via Matteo Jorgenson, inside the final 25km. However, Pogačar responded, leading to a period of stop-start racing that played into the hands of Healy and those he was with; by now a much smaller group as the 4,300m of climbing took its toll.
As the leaders raced into the final 15km, the gap over the yellow jersey bunch was just over 5:30, and it looked like the Healy dream of the yellow jersey was slowly turning to reality in the heat of France.
At that point, only a select group of riders were still at the front; Healy, Michael Storer (Tudor Pro Cycling), Ben O'Connor (Team Jayoc AlUla), Simon Yates (Visma-Lease a Bike), Thymen Arensman (INEOS Grenadiers) and Quinn Simmons (Lidl Trek).
Simmons was first to be dropped, at 14km to go, as Healy had long taken up permanent residency on the front of the group. He allowed the others sit on him as he set about going for the yellow jersey rather than prioritising a second stage win.
Healy was doing such a good job on the front of the group that the breakaway's advantage had grown back out to its maxumum, over six minutes, by the time they reached the 10km to go marker.
In the chase behind the leaders, Jorgenson again attacked in the final 10km; Visma Lease a Bike clearly intent on making Pogačar dig deep today. AG2R La Mondiale also took up the chase on the front of the reduced bunch for a time.
Eventually, with about 6km to go, the remains of the peloton split and Visma-Lease a Bike isolated Pogačar for the first time; several of the Dutch team in the small select group that emerged from the peloton but no other UAE Team Emirates XRG riders present.
However, Healy simply kept powering away at the front of the breakaway, never looking for a turn from the others and never getting one as he focused laser-like on taking the race lead. He was also riding into the lead into the young riders' classification and has moved up to 2nd in the mountains classification on a glorious day for the Irish.
Up front, Simon Yates attacked with just over 3km to go. And though Ben O'Connor was able to move with him, Healy was distanced and simply had to fight as best he could all the way to the line to take yellow. However, with a climb of 3.3km to finish, he had his work cut out.
At the front, as Thymen Arensman got across to Simon Yates and Ben O'Connor, Yates attacked again with just over 2km to go. He began to pull clear, having had an armchair ride for most of the day in the breakaway.
At that point, Healy was fighting but his gap on the yellow jersey group was down to 4:58 and he needed 3:56 to take the yellow jersey. Back in the 'peloton', that group had swelled a little as Visma-Lease a Bike took it up on the front, upping the pace and working against Healy and the time he needed to take the race lead.
Up front, Yates held on solo to win the stage from Arensman, with Ben Healy fighting all the way to 3rd place and only losing 30 seconds to Yates and passing O'Connor. Behind, yellow jersey Pogačar attacked on the final climb to the line, with Vingegaard the only rider able to follow. That move put Healy's hopes under serious pressure.
However, Healy took yellow.
Pogačar and Vingegaard did not continue to attack each other to the line and Healy finished 4:21 ahead of Pogačar, taking the yellow jersey from him by 29 seconds as the race goes into the rest day tomorrow.
