Took the lead from sanctimonious individual left holding drug (9)

'took the lead' is the definition.
('pioneer' can be a synonym of 'take the lead')

'sanctimonious individual left holding drug' is the wordplay.
'sanctimonious' becomes 'pi' (British abbreviation for pious).
'individual' becomes 'one' (an individual is one person).
'left' becomes 'red' (red can informally mean communist).
'holding' is an insertion indicator.
'drug' becomes 'e' (E is another name for ecstasy).
'one'+'red'='onered'
'onered' enclosing 'e' is 'oneered'.
'pi'+'oneered'='PIONEERED'

'from' is the link.