The 2025 Criterium du Dauphine concluded Sunday with stage 8 – a 133.3-kilometer battle though mountain terrain on a route from Val d’Arc to Plateau du Mont-Cenis, where a stage winner and the final podium of this year’s race would be decided. 

Though the stage would not feature any challenging Beyond Category climbs – contrary to yesterday’s stage 7 – stage 8 would feature many challenging and exhausting climbing meters distributed over two Category 1 climbs, two Category 2 climbs, and two Category 3 climbs. The stage would conclude with a ride to the finish line on the plateau after the final Category 1 climb of Col du Mont-Cenis. 

The general classification appeared to have been decided, with the significant time differences between the top 3 riders Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates), Jonas Vingegaard (Team Visma-Lease a Bike), and Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), but GC riders - including Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) - could possibly use the final opportunity to shake things up, while competing for a stage victory in partnership with pure climbers and breakaway hopefuls.

Stage 8 started under sunny skies in Val d’Arc, near Aix-les-Bains in the Savoie region. The weather report was forecasting mostly fine racing conditions, but with a slight risk of thunderstorms and rain late in the stage, which might frighten riders such as Jonas Vingegaard, who disliked racing in rainy weather conditions, and was apparently still suffering from the psychological repercussions of last year’s crash.

Despite his significant time loss, Vingegaard had claimed he was satisfied with his performance in yesterday’s stage and deemed it one of the best performances of his career. With just three weeks to the start of the Tour de France, this attitude unfortunately did not indicate the presence of the necessary willingness and motivation to fight incredibly hard and dedicate the needed time in the coming weeks to be able to obtain the needed form for the Dane to be able to pose a real challenge to Pogacar’s domination in the 2025 Tour de France. Perhaps team management could find a way to motivate the former Tour de France champion.

The speed was very fast during the initial part of stage 8 of the 2025 Criterium du Dauphine. Several riders, including Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck), launched attacks while trying to establish a viable breakaway. The many accelerations caused splits in the peloton and some riders were dropped from the rear part.

Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) joined forces with van der Poel at the front of the race and the duo had formed a small advantage over the chasing peloton after twelve kilometers of racing. Riders were still firing on all cylinders in the front part of the main peloton, so the strong breakaway duo got reeled in a few kilometers later.

A larger breakaway group formed in the following kilometers and got reshuffled a few times. The group featured Maxim van Gils (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Sepp Kuss (Team Visma-Lease a Bike), Tobias Foss (Ineos-Grenadiers), Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-QuickStep), Lenny Martinez (Bahrain-Victorious), Bruno Armirail (Decathlon-AG2R), Ben Healy, Enric Mas (Movistar), Ivan Romeo (Movistar), Mathieu van der Poel, Jake Stewart, and Alexey Lutsenko.

Jonas Vingegaard also joined the breakaway group but later fell back to the main peloton. His presence in the front group would have reduced its chances of staying away from the peloton and for the riders in the group to compete for a stage win.

After thirty-five kilometers of fast riding and with approximately one hundred kilometers remaining, the breakaway group had fought its way to a lead of almost 03:30 minutes. At the same time, Lidl-Trek’s Julien Bernard had launched a solo attack from the peloton and was hoping to make the leap to the front group.

Riders from Team Uno-X Mobility were pulling in the front part of the peloton and their hard work caused Julien Bernard to get reeled in. Meanwhile, more riders, including Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) and Magnus Cort (Uno-X Mobility), got dropped from the peloton.

The twelve remaining riders in the breakaway group were approaching Col de Beaune, which was a Category 1 climb.

Jake Stewart proved unable to keep up with the riders in the front group on Col de Beaune and was subsequently caught by the main peloton. Eleven riders remained in front as the group approached the summit.

Mathieu van der Poel broke away from the front group and went solo to chase the points in the intermediate sprint and possibly chase the stage victory solo or from a reduced breakaway group. The chasers were thirty-five seconds behind van der Poel, while the main peloton was more than three minutes back.

Cote de Saint-Andre was the next challenge on the climbing menu. The Category 3 climb was not expected to pose a noteworthy challenge for most of the riders. Riders from Uno-X Mobility were leading the main peloton.

It had started raining and solo frontman van der Poel almost crashed on the descent from Col de Beaune, as it had started raining and the roads were wet and dangerous. 42 kilometers remained.

With van der Poel and a chase group up the road, Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar attacked with other riders from the main breakaway when forty kilometers were left of the stage. Their attacking efforts were later neutralized.

Van der Poel had a lead of one minute when he was struggling on the reminiscences of Cote d’Aussois with twenty-five kilometers left to the finish line on the Plateau du Mont-Cenis. Ten men remained in the chase group, while the Uno-X Mobility-headed main peloton was 02:15 minutes behind. Pogacar was on the wheel of Vingegaard in the main peloton, while the roads were drying up after rain had fallen.

Van der Poel got caught by the chasers on Col du Mont-Cenis, while some of the riders in the breakaway got dropped.

Seven riders remained in the front group with a lead of 01:15 over the main peloton when twelve kilometers remained. Van Gils, Kuss, Paret-Peintre, Martinez, Healy, Mas, and Lutsenko were the usual suspects. UAE Team Emirates moved to the front of the main peloton and initiated a chase effort. It was yet to be seen if the breakaway optimists would get caught by the peloton before the finish line or battle for a noteworthy stage victory.

Enric Mas attacked from the front group and Ben Healy and Lenny Martinez joined the front. Healy blew some fuses and had to slow down, so Martinez and Mas pressed on up the climb. Healy joined a chase group with Kuss and Valentin Paret-Peintre.

A crash occurred in the rear part of the reduced main peloton, where the main GC favorites were located. The crash involved Sergio Higuita, Eddie Dunbar, Mikkel Honore, and Paul Seixas, but little damage was done and the riders got back on their bikes.

The GC main favorites group had been reduced to approximately eleven riders when four kilometers of the climb and nine kilometers of the stage remained. Tobias Halland Johannessen attacked and hoped to catch Martinez, Mas and other riders up the road before the stage finish. Remco Evenepoel attacked, but was joined by Vingegaard and Pogacar, but with Lipowitz suffering some meters behind. Would Evenepoel be able to replace Lipowitz on the third place of the stage podium?

Lenny Martinez launched a solo attack from the front duo with 7.7 kilometers left, leaving Enric Mas behind.

Vingegaard attacked from the GC favorites group and was joined by Pogacar. The duo jumped to the Kuss group and Kuss started working for Vingegaard. Vingegaard attacked again five hundred meters from the summit and 5.5 kilometers from the finish line. He was joined by Pogacar.

Further back, Evenepoel was doing his absolute best to reduce the advantage of Vingegaard and Pogacar, while increasing his lead over Florian Lipowitz, while hoping to make finish on the GC podium.

Lenny Martinez maintained a fast pace all the way to the summit of Col du Mont-Cenis and continued his impressive effort all the way to the finish line. Frenchman Martinez crossed the finish line as winner of stage 8 of the Criterium du Dauphine for the Bahrain-Victorious team.

Jonas Vingegaard launched a sprint shortly before the finish line and took second place, while Tadej Pogacar completed the stage podium. Matteo Jorgenson finished fourth, forty seconds behind stage winner Martinez, while Remco Evenepoel was fifth, Enric Mas sixth, and Florian Lipowitz finished seventh.

“Yesterday I was feeling super bad, but my team told me to never give up, so I tried again today, and I succeeded. It is a victory our whole team can be proud of before the Tour de France,” Martinez told Roadcycling.com after the stage.

Tadej Pogacar has won the 2025 Criterium du Dauphine. Jonas Vingegaard finished second in the GC, 01:01 minutes behind the winner, while Florian Lipowitz completed the GC podium, 02:21 minutes behind the winner. Remco Evenepoel is fourth on the GC, 04:11 minutes behind, while Tobias Johannessen is fifth.

“It’s been a really amazing week and what a great performance from my team again today,” Criterium du Dauphine champion Tadej Pogacar told Roadcycling.com after being celebrated on the podium.

“I got a lot of positives from the week of racing, and we’ll now go to Isola 2000 for a camp. We’ll do some extra work on the time trial, but otherwise I’m ready for the Tour de France,” Pogacar explained.

Stay tuned to Roadcycling.com for complete coverage from the 2025 Tour de Suisse and the 2025 Tour de France.