Stage 8 Tour de France Summary

Stage 8 of the Tour de France was a sprint stage. Stage 8 was relatively flat, and the peloton achieved speeds of almost 40 miles per hour on stage 8. Stage 9 is flat, like stage 8 is. There was only one climb on this stage, a fourth-category climb.

The main danger on stages like this is when the sprinters all race to the finish. What teams do is have dedicated lead-out men who shepherd the sprinters to the finish line. At the last second, the sprinter emerges in a mad dash to the finish line. The mountains begin on Monday. Do you like sprint stages, with their exciting finishes, or the test of mountain stages?

Stage 8 Of the Tour de France Summary

The winner of stage 8 was the sprinter and green jersey wearer, Jonathan Milan, who solidified his green jersey lead. Wout van Aert was second. Kaden Groves from Australia was third. Pascal Ackermann ended up fourth. Arnaund De Lie finished fifth in stage 8. They were all given the same time. Biniam Girmay, the Eritrean sensation from last year, was 19th. That was Milan’s first-ever stage win in the Tour de France.

There was no change in the overall classification in stage 8. Tadej Pogacar kept the overall lead. Remco Evenepoel is still in second place overall. Kevin Vauquelin is in third place overall.  Jonas Vingegaard is fourth, 1:17 seconds back. In fifth place is Mathieu van der Poel. In sixth place overall is American Matteo Joregenson.

Time Bonuses

There are small time bonuses at the finish line for the top finishers. The time bonuses are generally small. Ten seconds for the winner, 8 seconds for second place, and 4 seconds for third place. Sometimes, there are also small-time bonuses associated with intermediate sprints as well. These finishing time bonuses are even present on sprint stages, like stage 8. These time bonuses may seem small, but they are important.

The time bonuses add up and are a nice inducement to win stages. When one considers there are 21 stages on this year’s Tour de France, that means there are 2:10 seconds of time bonus associated with all the stages. Historically, the winner of the Tour de France wins by only a few minutes, sometimes by less than a minute, after 2,000 kilometers.

Recent Winners

In 2020, Pogačar won the tour by 59 seconds over Primoz Roglic. In 2021, Pogačar repeated. This time, Vingegaard was second. The gap was 5 minutes and 20 seconds. In 2022, Vingegaard won, and Pogačar was second by 2:43. Vingegaard repeated in 2023, and Pogačar was second. The gap was 7:29. Pogacar won last year, and Vinegaard was second by 6:17. Pogacar is thus the defending champion and is wearing #1 because of that.

Time bonuses matter because just a few seconds can matter in the grand scheme of things. Lance Armstrong won one of his seven tours by only 59 seconds. American Greg LeMond once won by just eight seconds. He was given the Congressional Gold Medal this week. That was a big honor and was a bit unexpected for a cyclist.

Conclusion

Stage 8 was a sprint stage. There was a breakaway, but the breakaway way only two riders and the leader, Mathieu Burgaudeau, had to change bicycles with about eight miles to go. He was in the breakaway all day and was voted the most aggressive rider of stage 8. 

We did not learn much about the overall classification in this flat stage. The bid leaders tried to stay safely out of the fray. Stage 9 goes from Chinon to Châteauroux and is 174 kilometers long. These stages, eight and nine, are hours of uneventfulness. Just speculation about whether the breakaway will stay away, punctuated by a very exciting finish.