Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) clinched victory in the sixth stage of Paris-Nice, navigating a challenging 209.8 km route from Saint-Julien-en-Saint-Alban to Berre-l’Étang. Pedersen held off a fast charging Josh Tarling (INEOS Grenadiers), who was second, and Tarling’s teammate, Samuel Watson, who took third.
The stage, characterized by unpredictable crosswinds and strategic echelon formations, saw João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) and Lenny Martinez (Bahrain – Victorious) lose significant time and fall behind in the GC standings.
The day’s parcours featured a series of category 3 climbs, including the Côte de Pouzilhac, Côte des Baux-de-Provence, and Côte de Mouriès. These ascents disrupted the peloton’s cohesion, leading to the formation of echelons. Visma-Lease a Bike’s aggressive positioning in the crosswinds split the main group, creating a 17-rider lead group that included Pedersen, Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), and Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek).
Mads Pedersen force a long sprint and it paid off.
“It was quite cold and then the body reacts differently. I opted for a long sprint, but Tarling was super strong. You should never flatten him out, not even in a sprint like this. Whether you win by one centimeter, half a meter or a meter… winning is winning.”
Victor Campenaerts (Visma | Lease a Bike) explained afterwards how the peloton split occurred.
“The plan beforehand was mainly to be at the front, but suddenly the moment was there and we gave up. The peloton immediately broke into a thousand pieces, so we kept going. We saw a group of Ineos riders coming even closer, we waited for that and the rest was history.”
GC leader Matteo Jorgenson (Visma | Lease a Bike) credited his team and their execution of their pre-race strategy as being pivotal.
“I am so proud of my teammates. We made a plan this morning and executed it to perfection. We looked at the course on the bus and knew that it could get quite windy on the descent of the Côte des Baux-de-Provence. That happened and when we looked back we saw gaps forming. That was the moment we rode as hard as we could towards the finish. We are here in France with a group of strong riders. Especially in these weather conditions we did a great job.”
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