The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Yates lands yellow after time penalty
Adam Yates inherited the yellow jersey of the Tour de France after Julian Alaphilippe was hit with a time penalty at the end of stage five, which was won by Wout van Aert, in Privas.
Van Aert won the 183km stage from Gap in a sprint finish but the drama came after the race was over, when commissaires took 20 seconds off Alaphilippe for an illegal feed inside the final 20 kilometres.
The decision saw MitcheltonScott’s Yates, who began the day four seconds down, elevated into the race lead as he became the ninth Briton in history to don the yellow jersey.
Yates said: “It’s not the way I imagined taking the jersey.
“I’m not even sure what happened to Julian – I heard he got a time penalty for taking a feed late.
“If I’m honest I don’t think anyone wants to take a jersey like this but I guess we’ll wear it tomorrow.
“Tomorrow I was looking to try to take the jersey anyway so we’ll go in with the same tactics, try and win the stage and see what happens.”
There was also an Irishman in green as Sam Bennett, beaten in the sprint by Van Aert, at least did enough on the day to move clear of former three-time world champion Peter Sagan in the points classification.
Alaphilippe’s DeceuninckQuickStep team-mate now leads Sagan by nine points, becoming the first Irishman to wear green since Sean Kelly won the points classification for the fourth and final time in 1989.
News of Alaphilippe’s time penalty took some of the shine off Bennett’s celebrations in green.
“It’s a bit disappointing,” he said. “We only heard about it obviously after the finish.
“It’s a bit of the highs and lows today. We thought we’d have yellow and green but unfortunately we don’t have it now.
“I’m honoured to wear (green) at least once and I’m really happy that happened today.”