Brilliant Biniam Girmay doubles up at 2024 Tour de France on stage 8 to further strengthen hold on Green Jersey

The brilliant Biniam Girmay has doubled up at the 2024 Tour de France, taking victory ahead of Jasper Philipsen in a punchy uphill sprint on stage 8.

Everyone had expected a massive fight for the breakaway today. When a trio of Stefan Bissegger, Neilson Powless and the King of the Mountains Jonas Abrahamsen went clear with an initial attack however, no one attempted to join initially. As such Abrahamsen was able to take maximum points on the first climb of the day unchallenged.

Finally though, some 25km following the initial attacks, the counters began to come from the peloton. Curiously, despite EF Education - EasyPost having two riders up the road already, it was Ben Healy and Alberto Bettiol who were leading the charge behind. With the duo unable to bridge the gap however, the leading trio remained up front for the second climb. When Abrahamsen attacked again though, Bissegger and Powless sat up this time, attempting to invite more attackers to join them out front.

Having also taken maximum points at the 3rd categorised climb of the day, by the time Abrahamsen reached the intermediate sprint at just around 125km to go, the Uno-X Mobility rider had stretched his advantage over the now calmed peloton to 5:40. When the peloton arrived at the sprint, Biniam Girmay took the group across the line, with his own teammate Gerben Thijssen right behind.

With around 90km to go, the peloton began to start winding up the chase of the lone leader. Over the next 20 kilometres however, Abrahamsen was still more than holding his own and at 70km to go, the Norwegian remained 5:23 ahead of the bunch. Before long however, the gap did begin to slide in favour of the peloton. Nevertheless, as the race headed into the final 30km, Abrahamsen was still a lone leader and still over two minutes clear.

As the pace of the peloton began to see some big names such as David Gaudu, Michael Matthews and Warren Barguil among others dropping out the back of the main group, the time gap to Abrahamsen was absolutely shattered. The impressive Norwegian wasn't giving up easily, but with just over 14km to go, the polka-dot jersey was finally back in the peloton.

From there, attention turned to the finale and despite the hilly profile of the day, there were still a number of the peloton's sprinters involved at the pointy end of the race. All the GC riders were safely through the 3km banner, then with the sprint trains taking over, it was Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team in control through the Flamme Rouge. As the sprints launched however, it was Bryan Coquard who opened things up. It wasn't to be for the Frenchman however, as Biniam Girmay secured a second stage win at this Tour de France ahead of Jasper Philipsen and Arnaud De Lie.