If there was a day when Ben Healy could take the yellow jersey could only be July 14th. On the day when the French celebrate the grip of the Bastille, a symbol of the fall of the Ancien regime, this scapiglied and unpredictable Irishman makes his revolution and goes to command the tour. But from pink to yellow the step is not short. On the contrary.

They are as always a shot and an escape of about forty kilometers This time not alone. This time not to win a stop like a few days ago but to aim for the big target, at the head of the ranking, with the fixed idea of recovering those almost four minutes who, at the start of Ennezat, divided him by his majesty Tadej Pogacar who has made everyone understand to everyone today that if there are no counterfeits, he will arrive in yellow in Paris with Jonas Vingegaard who will follow him on the wheel

It is fine in yellow ber yellow. He is well, because on the central massif in the tenth stage that brought the Le Mont Dore Puy de Sancy group he had the courage to blow up the counter with a formidable action. It always does so, fortunately. It seems that it runs at random even if in reality to “invent” and sparkle the races as he does the heart and legs and the want to try us. Always, even “not rigor of logic” which is then what makes the difference when what you have in your head happens.

Simon Yates wins the stage With pink patch on the nose just to remind everyone that just over a month ago on the windows he won the lap. He wins but in reality the emotion is all for this 24 -year -old from Kingswinford in the English Western Midlands 5 miles from Dudley, who, however, is Irish because Irish are his and he preferred his family passport thinking that in Ireland he would have had more chances to pedal and noticed than in England. The emotion is all for him because 38 years later Stephen Roche brings the yellow jersey back to the land of San Patrizio and it doesn’t matter if it is a “foster care” shirt because from Friday, on the Pyrenees, he will almost certainly have to return to the Slovenian “master”. Meanwhile, he enjoys it.

Ruffled hair, beard letting go, earrings, Wait for Pogacar to arrive on the finish line and counts the seconds that never seem to pass. Then on balance he finds that smart smile of those who do not understand if they are more shy or already know it long. One like this as much as you expect it in a donegal pub or a concert by the Pogues or Waterboys. Instead, you find it at the top of the tour with all the merits because it is difficult, if not impossible not to tear it, do not exalt, do not get excited when it starts and part. Even if you don’t know what it can combine, if it reaches the finish line, if it wins or if it is beaten. But it doesn’t matter. To make the revolutions you need courage. And this Irish courage has to sell it.