Thierry Marie's longest day

On 11 July 1991, Thierry Marie was clearly very keen to get back to his native Normandy. Having escaped after just 25 of this 259km-long stage that began in Arras, the prologue winner spent 234km all alone at the front to win in Le Havre, where he was 1-54 ahead of the pack and took the yellow jersey back from Greg LeMond. He was alone to an extent, but not quite... Close to him in the team director's car that day was team manager Cyrille Guimard's deputy, Bernard Quilfen, who had carried out his own long-range raid of 222km in 1977. Marie pulled off the second longest solo break in Tour history after the 253km that Albert Bourlon covered in 1947 between Carcassonne and Luchon. The stage also started without a yellow jersey as Greg LeMond had refused to wear it after the crash and abandon of Dane Rolf Sorensen, its previous holder, the day before. In 2004, a few days after the first edition of the Main Square Festival, Arras hosted the finish of the team time trial that the US Postal team won in crushing fashion. A Paris-Arras race took place between 1923 and 1959, and was revived in 2010 as the Paris-Arras Tour.