Tour de France (France) - Press Release: Ben O’Connor, 25, claimed his first win at the Tour de France in his first participation at the end of another rain soaked stage in the Alps. He got rid of his Colombian breakaway companions to become the 14th Australian stage winner for a total of 35 victories since Phil Anderson in 1982. The AG2R-Citroën rider virtually had the yellow jersey on the road but Tadej Pogacar responded to a late attack by Richard Carapaz to remain in the lead of the overall classification ahead of the first rest day.

An offensive race under the rain:

175 riders took the start of stage 9 under the rain in Cluses at 13.10. Non-starters: Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix). Benoît Cosnefroy (AG2R-Citroën) was the first attacker at km 2. Harry Sweeny (Lotto-Soudal) was next at km 6, soon rejoined by Davide Ballerini (Deceuninck-Quick Step). They were overhauled at the top of côte de Domancy by Pierre Latour (TotalEnergies) who continued solo before being rejoined by Dan Martin (Israel-Start Up-Nation) at km 20. At km 24, another duo was formed at the front by Sonny Colbrelli (Bahrain Victorious) and Anthony Perez (Cofidis), soon reinforced by Sergio Higuita (EF) and Fabien Doubey (TotalEnergies). Six riders took the lead before the intermediate sprint at Praz-sur-Arly (km 32.7) where Colbrelli preceded Michael Matthews (BikeExchange), Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-Quick Step), Dylan Teuns (Bahrain Victorious), Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ) and Chris Juul-Jensen (BikeExchange). A front group of 43 riders was formed at km 35 with an advantage of 2’ over the yellow jersey peloton.