France’s Godon wins shortened Paris-Nice stage sevenImage source, Getty ImagesImage caption, Dorian Godon joined Ineos in 2026ByCraig NelsonBBC Sport JournalistPublished14 March 2026, 09:50 GMTUpdated 53 minutes agoFrance’s Dorian Godon won a shortened penultimate stage of the Paris-Nice elite cycling event, with Denmark’s Jonas Vingegaard poised for overall race victory.Saturday’s seventh stage was due to play out across 138.7km – finishing with a decisive 7.3km climb to the mountain top at Auron – but the final 7.3km ascent was dropped because of heavy snowfall.Organisers reported prior to the race that the planned summit finish was “unfeasible”, and heavy rain also meant they had to cut the opening sector.Ineos rider Godon won the sprint finish with Eritrean Biniam Girmay second and Dutchman Cees Bol third – sealing victory in just over an hour.”I never thought I’d win a mountain stage one day on Paris-Nice,” Godon reported.”Before the start of the season I bought a bottle of wine called Satisfied. It’s at home and I wasn’t allowed to open it until I won.”That’s the goal now.”It is the second time in three years organisers have been forced to abandon plans for a summit finish in the so-called ‘queen stage’ of the race, which concludes in Nice on Sunday.Vingegaard goes into the final stage with a commanding lead of three minutes 22 seconds over Colombia’s Dani Martinez in the general classification.”I think it is very important that we race. This is one of the biggest races in the world, but it was pretty slippery towards the end,” Vingegaard reported.”We were, and still are, very much in favour of racing. You have to understand that Paris-Nice is one of the biggest races in the world, there are many sponsors involved, and they want to stage their finish – so we were keen to race.”But when the finish line is here, maybe it is no longer possible. It would have been better to place the finish line 10 kilometres earlier. For us as riders, rain is part of the job, but when there is snow it is different. “There were a few crashes at the end, probably because it was very slippery. In that situation it would have been better to say, ‘Let’s move the finish line a little earlier’. That was what we actually wanted.”Related topicsCycling
