7 days ago
How Ben Healy - grandson of Irish immigrants - made sporting history at the Tour de France
IN JUNE 2020 in the south Limerick hillside village of Knockaderry, a slight framed English accented Irish man smashed a field of the country's best home and international cyclists to take the national title.
Just days before, riding in the colours of the Andrew McQuaid managed development team Trinity Racing, he took the Time Trial title.
For many in Irish cycling it was the first sign that there was a significant new talent on the scene. Nicolas Roche, the son of Dundrum's former Tour de France winner Stephen, finished second to him.
This reporter attempted to interview Roche afterwards who was visibly enraged at the defeat while, across the road, the 20-year-old rider, Ben Healy, was light and welcoming, speaking fluidly about his delight to be Irish champ.
He had previously won the Time Trial title at junior level but his win at senior was a masterclass in the style of racing he is now famous for – a swashbuckling tactic of aggressive attacks from the pack.
It may have been shock news of this new talent for some in Ireland but on the continent Healy was already on his way to stardom.
The Tour de l'Avenir, translated as Tour of the Future, is the world's premier contest for young riders – it is a mini Tour De France raced at under 23 level and some of the legends of cycling first proved their worth there.
Healy did just that in 2018, taking the Queen Stage, or hardest stage of the race – it brought him to the attention of the cycling scouts – this was a talent to keep an eye on.
He has returned to Ireland to compete in the annual return of professionals from abroad for the National Championships and performed well in all outings – winning it a second time in 2023.
He has not just the aggressive exciting style of the road but also in the race of truth or Time Trial discipline – it makes him perfect for long range attacks.
Ben Healy leads Darnel Moore at Knockaderry in 2020 en route to his first senior National Road Title.
Niall O'Connor / The
Niall O'Connor / The / The
The Irish connection
He has a soft British midlands accent but he is the latest in a small but impressive group of Irish racing cyclists brought up in Britain that have sided with the country from which their relatives emigrated.
There are others who took the same nationality option, most notably two time Tour de France stage winner Dan Martin, and national champions Conor Dunne and Matt Brammeier.
Some did so out of patriotic interest, others for pragmatic cycling career opportunities because it opens the door to competitions – fewer riders to compete with for places. Either way Ben Healy declared for Ireland in 2016 as a teenager using the fact that his grandparents were Irish.
Healy's connections to Ireland are on his father's side. Bryan Healy was born in England to parents from Waterford and Cork. They moved as economic migrants to London in the 1960s in search of work.
Ben was born in 2000 and grew up in
Wordsley near Birmingham
where his racing cyclist father introduced him to the sport.
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According to an interview with
Velo magazine
in 2023 he caught the bug at a local track where he spent Sunday morning sessions with his pals.
In the same interview he explained that while at the beginning it was about the pragmatic nature of gaining an advantage he now delights in the Irish connection.
'I am super proud to represent that side of me,' he told Velo.
'My identity with Ireland has really grown. For sure I was a bit of an outsider within the cycling community in Ireland at first, but after a while, I started to make a few friends.
'There is still occasionally a bit of a backlash, I guess, but I really do feel welcomed and accepted, which is super nice. Now some of my really good friends within the sport are Irish. We've got a bit of a routine of going to Belfast post-season and then getting together, which is great,' he added.
Ben Healy wears the coveted Tour de France yellow jersey on the podium yesterday.
Alamy Stock Photo
Alamy Stock Photo
Success
The wins kept coming after he was the youngest rider, at just 18-years-old, to win a stage in the talent spotting Tour de l'Avenir.
Since then it has been a steady escalating evolution of success with wins across the season under the tutelage of Trinity Racing.
He then signed in 2022 for the EF procycling set up which is now EF Education Easy Post. It was set up by anti-doping campaigner and ex cyclist Jonathan Vaughters in the wake of the Lance Armstrong scandal.
This is the team where he has remained since taking major wins at the Giro d'Italia, the three week stage race that is the Italian equivalent of the Tour de France.
Last year at the Olympics he led the road race across the streets of Paris for much of the spectacle in a daring and tenacious effort but his hopes were dashed and Belgian Remco Evanepoel overtook him as he tired.
He has also finished on the podium of early season classics, or monuments as they are known, and is fast growing a reputation as one of the world's great puncheurs and baroudeur – cycling terms for a rider who excels over short sharp climbs on daring attacks from the peloton.
It was over that very terrain and using those tactics that saw him take the Tour de France stage across the rolling and steep hills of Normandy last Thursday.
'Le Tour' is a three week event raced over multiple days in which there is a stage winner each day and an overall winner who has the least amount of time across the course.
Yesterday, on a route across the French Massif Central Healy achieved a feat not seen since Stephen Roche in 1987 –
he became only the fourth Irish man
to take the coveted Yellow Jersey of race leader.
He will likely wear it until the coming mountain stages when the big General Classification guns of Tadej Pogacar, Remco Evanepoel and Jonas Vingegaard leave the phony war of the first week behind and begin the Alpine battles for the title.
Healy will likely revert back to his swashbuckling antics and join the daily lonely breakaway hunts for another stage win.
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