Biniam Girmay has made it a trifecta of Tour de France stage wins at the 2024 edition, with a thrilling bunch sprint win ahead of Wout van Aert and Arnaud Demare on stage 12.
There was some early drama on stage 12, with a crash in the peloton seeing the Maillot Jaune of Tadej Pogacar himself caught up. With 179 kilometres to the finale of the stage, the race leader had to stop for quite a few seconds as his chain had dropped. He regained his spot in the peloton quickly however, Fabio Jakobsen was not so lucky and abandoned the race as a result.
In the day's breakaway, four riders got themselves clear of the peloton including Jonas Abrahamsen, still in polka-dots despite the fact Pogacar has taken the lead in the King of the Mountains classification. Alongside the Uno-X Mobility man were Groupama - FDJ duo Valentin Madouas and Quentin Pacher, plus someone who has already won a stage this race, Anthony Turgis.
With around 115km to go, there was a second abandon of the day, with Bahrain - Victorious' Pello Bilbao stepping off the bike having been visibly struggling at the back throughout the first half of the stage, just a day after his teammate, Fred Wright had failed to meet the time cut, with both riders showing signs of illness.
With just under 70km to go, Turgis dropped out of the breakaway, whose lead was down to just 1:04 and returned to the peloton, leaving just three riders up ahead of the bunch. With 42 kilometres to go, the entirety of the breakaway was swept up by the peloton. Despite the relatively early catch usually drawing out counter attacks, on this occasion, all the riders seemed content to wait for other opportunities and let the sprinters have their day on stage 12.
As the stress levels began to rise before the inevitable bunch sprint, an Astana Qazaqstan Team man flipped scarily over his handle bars in the middle of the bunch with just over 10km to go, bringing a Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe rider down head over heels on top of him. Whether it was Primoz Roglic himself is not quite clear, but the whole of the Slovenian's team were caught out by the crash and were nearly two minutes down heading into the final 3km.
In the final sprint for the line however, it was Arnaud Demare who opened things up but in the finally, the Green Jersey Biniam Girmay made it a stunning Tour de France hat-trick ahead of Wout van Aert.
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Kieran WoodDeputy Editor-in-Chief
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He regularly contributes to DartsNews.com and CyclingUpToDate.com, where he covers professional cycling and darts. In cycling, his work includes liveblogs from major races, including the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia, and La Vuelta a España, alongside race reports and analysis. He has also conducted interviews with professional riders.
His reporting spans the full racing calendar, from one-day classics to stage races, with a focus on accurate, real-time coverage and clear contextual analysis. For statistics, results, and historical context, he regularly uses resources such as ProCyclingStats. To support reporting on rider activity and training context where relevant, he also references Strava.
In his work, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles as new, verified information becomes available.
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- Yeah, unreal.
parisbound0008-11-2026 - there needs to be space in life for pointless comments!Ketterechts08-11-2026
- That is a very lazy way of putting it but so far on this website it seems like everyone is happy to look at everything lazily, even things that annoy them intensely. All they want to do is state their feeling and position but ask most to analyse a problem or come up with solutions or improvements and you’re stunned by silence. Nobody even really knows how this all happens. It’s very simple and quick to just say the UCI did it but I bet you they didn’t, I bet you not more than 2 people were involved, more likely just 1. The UCI may be ultimately responsible but it is not their decision, this is about hierarchy, power and delegation. The fact that protest is possible also means it isn’t over and that MORE people could get involved for a thorough review which could throw up anything. It is highly likely it was a sole commissar who decided and has that power in a first round. Therein might lie the problem the UCI has to consider, is it acceptable to give so much authority to one single person when it is quite possible for them to have a natural bias or be too easily susceptible to imposed bias. Who is to say an individual in this position isn’t susceptible to collaboration with outside players with interests in the results, nations, families, teams, betting companies, etc. On the one hand we have sports where these problems have been worked on way more to reduce such problems, on the other hand we have sports with far stricter and more draconian rules not even concerning safety or obstruction that nobody really questions like false starts or stepping out of lane or zones in athletics. If cycling hastowork on itself, it would be good if protagonists (all kinds) would start doing a little more than just moaning over outcomes.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- Yes, so why not make comments less pointless?Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- What a race! I didn't expect Vanthourenhout to collapse like that, and Wyseure did take the fight to Nys, but there was no doubt at the end. I also wonder what Aubin Sparfel would be capable of were he to race in the elites now. In the U23 ranks he is making good work of Giel Lejeune, who himself is among the better riders in the elites, and a top 10 contender in the big races (3rd at Kleebergcross, 8th at Berencross and 5th at Heerderstrand). In the French Cup, Sparfel is significantly better than Romain Debord (8th at Koppenbergcross and 10th at the Euros) and Rémi Lelandais (12th at Koppenbergcross and 19th at the Euros).
Rafionain-Glas08-11-2026 - There really was nothing in it. Schreiber was so much faster, and Brand was fighting to stay in the wheel in the sprint. Schreiber did move a bit, but to say she closed the door doesn't make sense because Brand couldn't enter it anyway, abd she wasn't impeded.Rafionain-Glas08-11-2026
- He should have been allowed to go to Movistar. Right now both arent a good fit for each other and are just wasting each other's time and effortabstractengineer08-11-2026
- Thibau Nys does exactly what Iserbyt is calling forRafionain-Glas08-11-2026
- i did not see it. was the relegation justified or an overly hard decision? and don‘t cross riders deviate from straight lines all the time? bumping into each others when they cut corners, etc … why being more strict with the rules on the finish sprint?Ketterechts08-11-2026
- seems like we are advertising the website with pointless comments…Ketterechts08-11-2026
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3️⃣0️⃣th day in yellow 3️⃣0️⃣ème jour en jaune #TDF2024
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