International audienceIn this article we first review properties of the LuGre model, including zero-slip displacement, invariance, and passivity. An extension to include velocity-dependent microdamping is also discussed. The resulting model is then used to analyze stick-slip motion. The analysis shows that stick-slip motion modeled by the LuGre model is a stiff system with different behavior in the stick and slip modes as well as dramatic transitions between these modes. The dependence of limit cycles on parameters is discussed along with the notion of rate dependence