Having struggled to even get a contract for this year, before AG2R Citroën thew him a lifeline, Ben O'Connor has put in a career-defining ride on the Tour de France today going solo 17km from the finish.
Ireland's only rider in the race, Dan Martin (Israel Start-Up Nation), still appears to be searching for his form, though he is hotly tipped for a stage win at some point. He was 42nd today, some 25:27 down on the stage winner O'Connor.
The 25-year-old from Perth went in the early breakaway on the action-packed 144.9km stage to the summit finish in Tignes. And when that group out front split, O'Connor pulled clear with Sergio Higuita (EF Education-Nippo) and Nairo Quintana (Arkéa Samsic)
With a final climb of over 20km to end the stage today, those two climbing aces were formidable opponents for O'Connor to face. He was dropped by them on the descent of the penultimate climb before getting back on for the final ascent.
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And once on that climb the challenge of Quintana, who had been sprinting for climbers' points through the stage, fell away. A little further up the road, O'Connor then attacked Higuita and left him behind, with over 17km to go to the finish.
He was also more than eight minutes ahead of the remains of the peloton, containing yellow jersey Tadej Pogačar (UAE-Team Emirates). That meant O'Connor was virtual leader of the race for long periods of today's stage, though he had started back in 14th at 8:13.
While O'Connor was up the road riding to victory, and many of the men from the early breakaway were still in the gap between the leader and yellow jersey group, things started to get exciting back in that race leader's group.
Ineos Grenadiers hit the front, apparently to prepare the group for an attack by Richard Carapaz. He then attacked with about 4km to go but was tracked all the way by Pogačar. And when Carapaz eased up, after splitting the group, Pogačar surge forward and he was gone. Nobody was able to even try to respond.
At the finish line, O'Connor won the stage - an absolutely epic victory - by 5:07 from Mattia Cattaneo (Deceuninck-QuickStep). After him came Sonny Colbrelli; the Bahrain-Victorious rider having gone for the intermediate sprint early in the day, winning it and then persisting with his effort.
Seconds later, the last two breakaway survivors finished: Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) in 4th at 5:36 and Franck Bonnamour (B&B Hotels p/b KTM) in 5th at 6:02.
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Bonnamour was caught on the line by Tadej Pogačar (UAE-Team Emirates), who finished 6th on the stage and easily did enough to close several minutes on winner O'Connor to retain his yellow jersey.
A four-man general classification group - the riders Pogačar had attacked - were just 32 seconds behind the young Slovenian; Caparaz in 7th, Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) in 8th, Enric Mas (Movistar) in 9th, Rigoberto Urán (EF Education-Nippo) in 10th and Quintana on the back of that group in 11th having also taken over the polka dot jersey.
The stage result means Pogačar is still in yellow and some of those who were closest to him - including Wout van Aert (Jumbo Visma) who was 2nd overall this morning - are now further back having lost time today.
For his efforts, 25-year-old O'Connor has moved up to 2nd overall and he is now 2:01 down on the race leader, with Uran 3rd at 5:18, Vingegaard 4th at 5:32, Carapaz 5th at 5:33 and Mas in 6th at 5:47.
The riders have a rest day tomorrow before hostilities resume on Tuesday with stage 10. That's 190.7km from Albertville Valence and though it may favour the sprinters, there is an early climb and the intermediate sprint is also on a small climb.
The likes of Colbrelli's team and Peter Sagan's Bora-hansgrohe, may seek to drop Mark Cavendish (Deceuninck-QuickStep), who survived today and is still in green.
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