‘A hell of a day’ – Back to the breaks for Ben O’Connor as mountains materialise at Tour de France

The Tour de France may not have started as hoped for Ben O’Connor and Jayco-AlUla but as the race headed into his preferred mountain terrain on stage 10 the Australian wasted no time trying to make his mark by unfurling the trademark aggressive tactic of flying into the break.

The 165-kilometre, eight-climb day to Le Mont Dore was always set to be a big battle in the Massif Central and as such the fight to make it out the front on Bastille day was on. There was much at stake for many, O’Connor certainly among them as after a crash on the opening day and a tough opening week he was 15:23 down on GC in 25th at the start of stage 10. His mentality, however, was far from that of a rider conceding defeat.