Britain’s Simon Yates wins stage 12 of Tour de France after incredible breakaway effort

SIMON YATES spent all day in a brutal mountain breakaway — and then found a turn of speed to sprint to his first stage victory at the Tour de France.

Bury ace Yates, 26, led Spaniard Pello Bilbao and Austrian Gregor Muhlberger over the final climb at Hourquette d'Ancizan before a 13-mile descent into the Pyreneean town of Bagneres-de-Bigorre.

This was the second major mountain stage of this year's Tour and the Yellow Jersey group, including Team Ineos leader Geraint Thomas, drifted in 9min 35sec behind the Yates group.

The Vuelta a Espana winner has now completed stage wins at all three grand tours, including the Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and Vuelta.

Simon is only at the Tour to work for his twin brother Adam, but rode a superbly judged 129-mile stage.

The Mitchelton-Scott rider said: "I've been saving energy until we got to the mountains and this was my first chance to try something and I grabbed it with both hands.

"I wasn't very confident of beating either of them, I didn't know how fast they were.

"I knew I needed to be in front coming off the last corner so I made sure to do that and held on to win.

"I'm very proud and hope there are more to come.

"My main priority is to help Adam, today was one of my opportunities to get up the road and we'll see how it goes.

"We're having a fantastic Tour, long may it continue."

Thomas remains second on general classification, 1min 12sec behind Yellow Jersey wearer Julian Alaphilippe.

But the Welshman is expected to pick up time in Friday’s 17-mile individual time trial before Saturday’s epic stage finish up the infamous Pyrenean climb, the Tourmalet.