Tour de France
Until Cadel Evans' 2nd place finish in the 2007 Tour de France, Phil Anderson was the highest Australian finisher in the overall race classifications, coming fifth in 1982 and again in 1985. In 1981, he first wore the race leaders yellow jersey, the first for a non-European cyclist. He again donned the yellow jersey in 1982 for 9 days. He was also awarded the white jersey as best young (under 25) rider in 1982.

In his early years on the tour, as the sole Australian, he was nicknamed Skippy, after the kangaroo character in the 1960s Australian children's television series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo. Coming from Australia, the young Phil Anderson faced a big challenge "It was a big change; I'd never lived out of home before, so that was a big difference, and then there's the length of the races; you know all of a sudden you're riding 200 kilometres a day instead of back here you'd be racing 80 or 100 kilometres a day; huge fields, you turn up at a race and you'd have 200 riders, 250 riders." he told a reporter for The Sports Factor radio program on the ABC in 1999.

There was strong motivation for Anderson to perform well "It's difficult because I was on a French team, and I felt that the French riders got priority, and I had to go a bit deeper or had to be a little better than some of my colleagues on the team. But that hardened me, and put pressure on me, and I think became part of my make-up in the end."