Nicolas Roche turns the screw off the front of the breakaway on today's 9th stage at the Tour de France. Daryl Impey ran out the winner, but Roche was one of the strongest, splitting the breakaway.
After an indifferent season last year when he uncharacteristically abandoned the Giro d'Italia, Nicolas Roche looked rejuvenated at the Tour de France today.
While his bid for stage victory did not land him the win on stage 9, he went closer to taking the stage than his eventual 6th place suggests.
With about 15km remaining on the 170.5km stage from Saint-Étienne to Brioude Roche surged off the front of what remained of the 15-rider breakaway.
The Team Sunweb Irish rider dug deep and distanced most of the others, with only Tiesj Benoot (Lotto Soudal) able to hold him.
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That move was a clear attempt by Roche to put all his eggs in one basket and go for broke on the climb in the hope he would pull clear to win alone.
However, while he and Benoot were riding away, eventual stage winner Daryl Impey (Mitchelton-Scott) was doing a great ride behind the two leaders.
The South African, who has entered the most prolific stage of his career as he has gotten a bit older, managed to get across to Roche and Benoot to make it three up front.
That meant that going over the top of that Cote de Saint-Just climb, Roche had played a number of his cards and he still had two wily and strong operators in tow.
The next important move came on an uncategorised incline with about 8km remaining to the finish.
This time it was Benoot doing the damage; the Belgian rider accelerating and Impey immediately jumping onto his wheel.
At that point the first cracks began to appear in Roche's day; his earlier efforts clearly having sapped his legs of strength.
Impey was able to stay with Benoot and that South African-Belgian pairing rode away from the Irishman.
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At the finish it was Impey who got the better of Benoot in a two-up sprint to win as Roche was caught and passed some of the other escapees.
Jan Tratnik (Bahrain Merida) came through for 3rd just 10 seconds behind the two leaders and with him, taking 4th and 5th in the same time, were Oliver Naesen (AG2R-La Mondiale) and Jasper Stuyven (Trek-Segafredo).
Then came Roche four seconds later in 6th place and just 14 seconds behind the two leaders after a really close finale.
While he could not add to his two Grand Tour victories to date in his career, Roche made a breakaway of real quality today and when the final climb arrived he was the man hammering on the front.
However, Benoot and Impey rode a great finale and once Roche's big climbing effort failed to shake the other two, he was up against it in his bid to win.
The 15-man escape group he was in had a maximum lead over the peloton in excess of 16 minutes.
Lukas Pöstlberger (Bora-Hansgrohe) was among the breakaway and with about 40km to go he lit it up.
The 14 men he left behind then split in half in the effort to catch them; Roche, Impey, Benoot, Naesen, Stuyven, Tratnik and Marc Soler (Movistar) eventually closing up to the lone leader.
Once they were on the final climb Roche, who had done a lot of work to chase down Pöstlberger, pressed on again to drag Benoot clear, only to be caught by Impey.
Behind the breakaway, a reduced peloton finished 16:25 down but there was some late drama for them.
Romain Bardet (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Richie Porte (Trek-Segafredo) and George Bennett (Jumbo Visma) went clear on the Cote de Saint-Just, but were closed down by Team Ineos.
Though the breakaway gained huge time, there was no change in the overall.
Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep) retains the yellow jersey by 23 seconds from former race leader Giulio Ciccone (Trek-Segafredo), with Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), who is 53 seconds down, in 3rd overall.
Dan Martin (UAE Team Emirates) finished in the reduced peloton today and he remains in 16th overall at 2:09.
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