The Irish riders made their presence felt at the Tour of Britain on yesterday's stage 4 with Dan Martin and Nicolas Roche in the top 10 on the difficult uphill finish and cementing their positions in the general classification.
Irish national champion Ben Healy went on the attack during the 210km stage from Aberaeron to Great Orme, Llandudno. And while he was eventually caught he put in a solid ride off the front for a time.
The stage finish atop the Great Orme climb – 1.9km at 9.4 per cent – did not deter early attackers, with a six-man breakaway going clear.
Ben Healy and his Trinity Racing team mate, Thomas Gloag, along with Marc Soler (Movistar), went off the front in a bid to catch the breakaway later in the stage. Soler attacked first, with Healy going after him, Gloag in tow, with just over 70km to go.
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The trio combined and quickly pulled out one minute on the peloton, with the breakaway still about ½ minutes further up the road. While the Healy chase group got across to the leaders, they were all caught with about 40km to go.
Just before they were recaptured, Irish international
Rory Townsend (Canyon dhb SunGod) had a brief go off the front of the bunch,
but was closed down.
When the race hit the final climb it turned into a battle between Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep) and Van Aert (Jumbo Visma), with race leader Ethan Hayter (Ineos Grenadiers) trying to hang on to them.
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Counter-attack! @solermarc93 (@Movistar_Team) has accelerated from the peloton, taking @TrinityRacing_ duo @_BHealyyy and @thomasgloag with him.
They're 1'20" behind the breakaway with 70 kilometres remaining.
📺 Watch the stage live on ITV4#TourOfBritain 🔴🟢⚪ pic.twitter.com/cQpFSxFueg— Lloyds Tour of Britain (@TourofBritain) September 8, 2021
Dan Martin and Michal Woods, both of Israel Start-Up Nation, were also in the mix; Martin dragging Woods into contention on the front. However, the Canadian had no answer to the power of Van Aert and Alaphilippe when they kicked for the finish on the steep incline.
Van Aert just about took the stage win from Alaphilippe,
with Woods in 3rd at one second, Mikkel Honoré (Deceuninck-QuickStep)
4th at four seconds and Hayter 5th at eight seconds.
Ireland’s Martin was next – 6th at 13 seconds – while Roche was 10th at 29 seconds. The stage result and time bonuses meant Van Aert retook the race lead, after his second stage win, from Hayter by two seconds. Alaphilippe is 3rd at 11 seconds, with Martin in 7th at 56 seconds and Roche 11th at 1:38 with four stages remaining.
Today's stage 5 sees the riders tackle 152km from Alderley Park to Warrington, with some medium climbs in the first half of the day's action.
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