{"id":261564,"date":"2025-07-13T12:28:23","date_gmt":"2025-07-13T12:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/261564\/"},"modified":"2025-07-13T12:28:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-13T12:28:23","slug":"tour-de-france-stage-9-live-can-anyone-stop-jonathan-milan-in-another-sprint-finish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/261564\/","title":{"rendered":"Tour de France Stage 9 Live: Can anyone stop Jonathan Milan in another sprint finish?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Refresh <\/p>\n

2025-07-13T12:24:46.769Z<\/p>\n

Crash at the back of the peloton with Samuel Watson, Ion Izagirre, Tobias Foss, Pavel Bittner and S\u00f8ren W\u00e6renskjold among those caught up. All riders are now back on their bikes and underway.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T12:19:20.940Z<\/p>\n

Some incredible scenery on today’s stage, as the race is surrounded by sunflower fields and French farmland.<\/p>\n

\"CHATEAUROUX,<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T12:13:16.110Z<\/p>\n

It seems impossible for a breakaway to go all the way on today’s stage, but if the gap to our leading duo continues to grow, then it could become a very dangerous move for the peloton behind. Both Rickaert and Van der Poel have proven themselves to be incredibly strong on this sort of terrain, so do not count them out just yet.<\/p>\n

\"CHATEAUROUX,<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T12:10:06.173Z<\/p>\n

Rickaert and Van der Poel now have an advantage of more than four minutes over the peloton. The pair are basically riding a two-up time trial at the moment, with Lidl-Trek chasing them in the main bunch behind.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T12:05:20.934Z<\/p>\n

Mathieu van der Poel takes maximum points at the intermediate sprint in S\u00e9rigny, with his breakaway companion and teammate Jonas Rickaert in second place. Jonathan Milan sweeps up the remaining points from the peloton ahead of Biniam Girmay and Tim Merlier.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:50:30.014Z<\/p>\n

Mathieu van der Poel currently sits in fourth place in the points classification on 108 points, with a 74-point deficit to Jonathan Milan. Is the Dutchman’s foray into the breakaway a clear indication that he will be targeting the maillot vert for the remainder of the race?<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:38:53.564Z<\/p>\n

The intermediate sprint is coming up in around 15km, with Rickaert and Van der Poel seemingly fully committed to this breakaway effort. Their advantage has already gone up to over two minutes.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:36:00.562Z<\/p>\n

Lidl-Trek are currently pacing at the front of the peloton to control the gap to the breakaway, with none of the other teams seeming particularly interested in going up the road. The leading duo already have an advantage of nearly two minutes over the main bunch.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:31:42.437Z<\/p>\n

Jonas Rickaert attacked as soon as the flag dropped and he has now been joined by his Alpecin-Deceuninck teammate Mathieu van der Poel. With the intermediate sprint coming so early in the stage, is this purely a points-scoring exercise by the Dutchman?<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:27:22.991Z<\/p>\n

The flag has dropped for the official start and Alpecin-Deceuninck are already on the move at the head of the race.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:26:37.064Z<\/p>\n

As promised, Wout van Aert has declared his intentions to contest the sprint today.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:23:50.944Z<\/p>\n

Will any teams look to make the early breakaway on today’s stage? Or will we have to wait until later into the stage to see some moves go up the road?<\/p>\n

\"LAVAL,<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:19:31.811Z<\/p>\n

After a late mechanical ruled him out of contesting the sprint in Laval yesterday, could Tim Merlier take his second victory of the race on today’s stage?<\/p>\n

\"CHINON,<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:12:55.490Z<\/p>\n

The riders have rolled out in Chinon for the neutral start of today’s stage. There’s around 7km to go until the flag drops for the official start.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:07:39.693Z<\/p>\n

Aside from Mark Cavendish, the only other rider to win a stage of the Tour de France in Ch\u00e2teauroux was Mario Cipollini on stage 6 in 1998.<\/p>\n

\"Mario<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T11:00:23.997Z<\/p>\n

Here’s a look at the map of today’s stage as the race heads in a south-easterly direction from Chinon to Ch\u00e2teauroux.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

(Image credit: ASO)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T10:56:01.629Z<\/p>\n

With today’s intermediate sprint coming after just 24km of racing in the town of S\u00e9rigny, some of the sprinters’ teams may look to control the race early on to give their riders a chance to compete for the maximum points.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T10:49:53.126Z<\/p>\n

‘I’ll announce it next time on Twitter’ \u2013 Wout van Aert rediscovers sprint form with surprise second-place at Tour de France<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Having been absent from bunch sprints for most of the year, Wout van Aert found his sprinting legs yesterday to finish runner-up behind Jonathan Milan in Laval. Could the Visma-Lease a Bike rider challenge for the victory again today?<\/p>\n

\"Team<\/p>\n

(Image credit: LOIC VENANCE\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T10:42:02.668Z<\/p>\n

Today’s stage finishes in Ch\u00e2teauroux, a place synonymous with Mark Cavendish, who won his first Tour de France stage here in 2008. From there, he would then go on to break the all-time stage win record with 35 victories, winning in Ch\u00e2teauroux on a further two occasions, in 2011 and 2021.<\/p>\n

Image 1 of 3<\/p>\n

\"Cycling(Image credit: Getty Images)\"Cycling(Image credit: Getty Images)\"CHATEAUROUX,(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T10:12:34.964Z<\/p>\n

Yesterday we saw Jonathan Milan beat Wout van Aert to take the stage win. Behind them, the other sprint contenders were some way back, from Kaden Groves in third to Tim Merlier in 56th.<\/p>\n

Here’s what the pair of them had to say after the race to Laval.<\/p>\n

Tour de France sprint defeat on stage 8 means different things for Kaden Groves and Tim Merlier<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

2025-07-13T10:08:09.285Z<\/p>\n

Around an hour to go until the neutralised start, which will take place at 13:10 local time.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:59:46.395Z<\/p>\n

On the eighth day, the Tour de France rested – Why the peloton rode steady on the road to Laval<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

‘It was quite an easy day, I think a lot of guys in the bunch’ says Jonas Vingegaard<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:49:56.807Z<\/p>\n

Here are the current GC standings at the Tour de France<\/strong><\/a> after stage 8. No change at the top.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:42:19.749Z<\/p>\n

Tour de France stage 8: Jonathan Milan holds off Wout van Aert to win Laval sprint<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Kaden Groves third as Lidl-Trek rider carries green jersey to his first Tour victory<\/p>\n

\"LAVAL,<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:40:59.660Z<\/p>\n

Here’s a look back at yesterday’s results.<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:29:59.352Z<\/p>\n

The battle for the green jersey is set to reignite today in the second of two sprint stages this weekend. Jonathan Milan won Saturday’s stage 8 to take back the jersey from Tadej Poga\u010dar.<\/p>\n

He now lies on 182 points and holds a 26-point lead over the Slovenian, while Biniam Girmay is in third place on 124 points.<\/p>\n

\"Italian<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

2025-07-13T09:24:31.674Z<\/p>\n

A look at the profile for today’s stage. No categorised climbs and just 1400m of climbing on the route from Chinon to Ch\u00e2teauroux. It’s a perfect day for the pure sprinters.<\/p>\n

\"Profiles<\/p>\n

(Image credit: ASO)<\/p>\n

2025-06-27T14:57:10.707Z<\/p>\n

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of stage 9 of the Tour de France!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Refresh 2025-07-13T12:24:46.769Z Crash at the back of the peloton with Samuel Watson, Ion Izagirre, Tobias Foss, Pavel Bittner…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":261565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4104],"tags":[4230,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-261564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114845930738344610","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/261565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}