Tour de France stage 1: A victory for Julian Alaphilippe and a victory for France

Procycling
Julian Alaphilippe celebrates as he wins stage 1 of the 2021 Tour de France (Image credit: Getty Images)

The Tour de France needed this. Amid a hectic summer of sport, with France being one of the favourites for European Championships, Tour organiser Christophe Prudhomme designed a Tour opening with Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep) in mind. In order to get any kind of traction in the country at last, away from the die-hard cycling fans, the Tour needed Alaphilippe to deliver. Well, he delivered.

We all know that France has not had a Tour winner since Bernard Hinault in 1985, but the country has not even won the opening stage proper of their national race since 2006, with Jimmy Casper, or any kind of opening stage since 2000, with Christophe Moreau. This is something new.

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Adam Becket is the staff writer for Procycling magazine. Prior to covering the sport of cycling, he wrote about ecclesiastical matters for the Church Times and politics for Business Insider. He has degrees in history and journalism. A keen cyclist himself, Adam’s favourite race is the Tour of Flanders or Strade Bianche, and he can't wait to go to the Piazza del Campo for the end of the race one day.