Sean Kelly hails Ben Healy after racing to Tour de France yellow jersey

Ireland's Ben Healy has taken the Yellow Jersey in the Tour de France.

It is a first Irish maillot jaune for 37 years, since Stephen Roche.

This followed a powerhouse Bastille Day Stage Ten ride when having been prominent in an early break Healy spent most of the day in virtual yellow.

With a minute to defend on a steep climb some 2.5km out from the finish and in danger of being swamped, the Irish Olympian stayed in the fight and finished third overall.

"It was insanely tough. It was a battle against myself and I had to dig in deep and my team-mates put in so much work for me that I really wanted to pay them back," said Healy who is looking to become the first Irish Tour de France winner since Roche won in 1987.

"How often do you get an opportunity to put yourself into yellow? I had to take that with two hands and go for it."

The first up good news is that Healy gets a day to rest on his laurels, as the riders have Tuesday off before racing resumes on Wednesday with a 156.8km stage around Toulouse.

This is expected to produce a sprint finish and is therefore unlikely to shake up General Classification.

It will be all change however as Thursday has been flagged as one of the 2025 Tour's hardest stages, a massive Pyrenees climb to the ski resort at Hautacam.

As it stands, the UK's Simon Yates took the Stage 10 win with Dutchman Thymen Arensman second some nine seconds back and Healy 31 seconds behind.

Which in turn left Healy in yellow on 37hrs 41mins 49secs, three times winner and race favourite Tadej Pogacar 29 seconds back with Remco Evenepoel at one minute 29 seconds.

"What a performance by Ben Healy first of all," said Irish cycling legend Sean Kelly as Healy, who rides for the American registered EF Education-EasyPost team crossed the line.

"And we had seen Pogacar going with a really big attack there in the earlier part of the climb but then knocked it off.

"I'm sure he got information from his Director Sportif 'you do not have to ride here, you know it's going to be very close to the yellow jersey, let's not push on and allow Ben Healy, after the performance he put in, go'.

"I think the teams recognised that, we can see they realised that he was taking over the yellow jersey.

"This was the performance of his life For Ben Healy. We've seen doing magnificent things before but today was another step up."

Hopes had been high Healy might go well before the race began with Ian Dyer, High Performance Coach to the Ireland Olympic cyclists, noting: "Instinct says we could see Ben begin to prosper once it starts to get hilly.

"But I think the complexities behind getting a stage race win kind of really rely on you often getting in the main breakaway of the day and being allowed a little bit of rope to make some headway.

"Anything in the big mountains would obviously suit Ben as opposed to the flatter stages because all the teams that have got a sprinter in the race are going to want to try and keep the race together, keep the peloton together to deliver a sprinter to the finish."

The 24 year-old Healy was born near Birmingham. His grandparents on his father Bryan's side are from Waterford and Cork and they moved to London in the 1960s.

He is a two time national champion (once each in the road race and time trial), ridden the road race at the 2020 UCI Road World Championships and represented Ireland at the 2024 Paris Olympics

He has previously won a Giro d'Italia stage (2023). There were podium finishes in Liege-Bastogne-Liege and Amstel Gold Race - second to the 2025 tour de France favourite Tadej Pogacar there.

As a junior, he has also had stage wins on Tour de l'Avenir and Baby Giro

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