"Something was definitely thrown onto the road" - Allegations of sabotage after numerous punctures in finale of stage 8 at 2025 Tour de France

Jonathan Milan powered to the first Tour de France stage win of his career on stage 8 of the 2025 Tour de France on Saturday afternoon, impressively denying Wout van Aert among others in the fight for the line. There were some notable names missing from the sprint though, and might that have been the result of sabotage?

“When you win a sprint, you want all the top contenders to be there,” details Jonathan Milan's sports director at Lidl-Trek, Steven De Jongh in a post-stage interview with In de Leiderstrui afterwards. “What frustrates me the most is that something was definitely thrown onto the road at that point – there were four or five punctures in no time.”

Whilst De Jong's colleague Kim Andersen wasn't quite so forthright in his comments, he too admitted that sabotage was a definite possibility. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it was sabotage," the Danish sports director at Lidl-Trek noted. "We’ll probably find out more later. It wouldn’t be the first time saboteurs have thrown sharp objects onto the road during the Tour.”

The Lidl-Trek DS' also got support in their theory from the boss of Groupama-FDJ Marc Madiot, who saw his own sprint hopeful Paul Penhoet puncture out of stage winning contention. “It’s unfortunate that so many riders suffered flats in the exact same spot," the Frenchman told Cyclism'Actu. "You could easily imagine someone had thrown nails on the road. It’s just not right. It ruins the whole day.”