Daniel Martin finished off an extremely aggressive showing by his Garmin-Sharp team when he beat Jakob Fuglsang in a two-rider sprint to win the final Pyrenean stage of this year's Tour de France. Having been designated as the team leader in the pre-race meeting, the Irishman was happy to pay back his teammates for the huge work that had laid the foundations for his late attack.

It may be the Sky collapse that has caught most attention after today's final Pyrenean stage of the Tour de France but one team had a crucial role to play to make it happen. Garmin-Sharp were on the attack throughout the entire stage and were justly rewarded when Daniel Martin took the stage win and moved into 8th on GC.

Prior to the race, the team had vowed to use its strength in numbers to blow the race to pieces and that was exactly what they did as soon as the flag was dropped. On the flat stretch leading to the day's first climb, David Millar and Jack Bauer went off the front and while they were reeled in a little later, the team just continued its aggression as soon as the road pointed upwards.

Tom Danielson, Ryder Hesjedal, Andrew Talansky and Martin himself were all involved in multiple attacks while the Sky team crumbled under the pressure. When the day's most long-lasting move finally went clear, Hesjedal made sure that Garmin was represented, thus allowing Martin to save energy in the peloton.

Before the final climb, Hesjedal was reeled in, and it was all back together. The main GC riders were looking intensely at each other and the isolated Froome had to carefully gauge his effort and choose which attacks to close down. Martin knew that he was not feared by the Briton and so he saw his chance to solo off the front.

The Irishman was lucky that Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) closed the gap as the two formed a dup strong enough to keep the chasing peloton at bay. Martin had no trouble beating Fuglsang in the sprint and so took the first Irish stage win since Stephen Roche's 1992 triumph.

Afterwards, he was full of praise of his team's performance and revealed that it had always been the plan that he should finish it off.

“Every win is important and special in its own way," he said. "It was such an incredible day today because this team Garmin-Sharp shows such a team spirit. Everyone gave 100 per cent today and some of the guys nearly missed the time limit because they gave so much for my victory. We decided this morning on the bus that I was going to try and win the stage and we've succeeded so it's incredible."

Martin is known as a fast finisher and he knew that he was the favourite to beat his Danish companion in the sprint.

“It's hard to describe how it feels; it's more relief actually because I knew I was the favourite coming into the sprint and I was quite confident... but I still had to do it," he said. "So to come across the line knowing that I've won a stage of the Tour de France is amazing. In the end, the scale of the event wasn't on my mind – it was just another bike race. I was so focused on his wheel and beating that guy in the sprint that I didn't even look behind once to see where the peloton was. It was just a case of focus on the finish line and get there first."

Martin is an experienced winner, having already taken a stage win at the Vuelta, triumphed in the Liege-Bastogne-Liege and taken overall victories at the Tour of Poland and the Volta a Catalunya. He attributes that winning ability to a very relaxed attitude in the heat of the action.

“I think there was a calmness that I developed in the sprint, rather than confidence," he said. "I've always had that sort of calmness, like when I won the ninth stage of the Vuelta it was much the same sort of feeling. In the big situations I seem to be able to relax very well and just be in control and it pays off.”

Martin has now moved himself into 8th overall and will enjoy tomorrow's rest day before the race resumes with a mostly flat stage in Bretagne on Tuesday.