Mads Pedersen stepped onto the Ronde van Vlaanderen podium for the third time in his career after an impressive team performance that also saw Jasper Stuyven round out the top five.
On the Oude Kwaremont, with 55km of racing to go, the first move from the big favorites was made and split the race into pieces with the gap to a leading group, which included Daan Hoole after he was part of a counter attack that joined forces with the early breakaway, falling quickly.
From this point on, it was game on with Pedersen able to match the effort of Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates XRG) and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin–Deceuninck) right up until their acceleration on the Oude Kruisberg/Hotond where he dropped back to a chasing duo: Jasper Stuyven and Wout van Aert (Visma–Lease a Bike).
The five riders did eventually come back together again in time for the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont, where Pogačar made his winning move, shaking the other race favorites, including Pedersen and Stuyven, off his wheel.
The Lidl-Trek duo remained together with van Aert and van der Poel in the chasing group with the current world champion’s advantage extending over the Pateberg before the run into the finish in Oudenaarde.
In the sprint for the remaining podium places, Stuyven set a fast tempo for Pedersen inside the flamme rouge before the Danish rider launched his powerful sprint with 250 meters to go and was ultimately the strongest out of the group, eventually stepping onto the podium after securing second place.
Stuyven crossed the line in fifth, his second best finish at the Tour of Flanders, after an equally excellent ride from the Belgian on home soil.
https://twitter.com/LidlTrek/status/1908887406373126333
It was a really good race. As a team we raced really well and we optimized all our chances to win the race, I am proud of the race I did today and how I was able to follow on the climbs but, in the end, Tadej is just so strong so all in all, I am super happy with the team, how we ride, and my own performance.
We are fighting all day to try to win the race, everyone was going all out even before he [Tadej] made his move and we were just beaten by a better guy and we have no regrets. We have to accept that he is the best cyclist ever and he is beating us fair and square. Chapeau to him, he is doing so much for cycling and making the image of cycling, crazy big. It's a pain in the ass to be racing against these guys [Pogi & MVDP] but it's also nice to be a part of racing like this with these guys.
It was pretty ideal to be with me and Jasper in this group and to be able to play like that. Jasper knows that I would like to do a sprint like this from high speed so, with 1km to go there was a bit of hesitating and slowing down but then with 500m to go, Jasper started to speed up and then with 250m to go I saw the moment to start the sprint and it was enough. Thanks to him for making the perfect lead out in the end, and in general, thanks to the whole team for the work today.
With 8km headwind, and four guys in the group [behind Pogi], I hoped we would be able to catch him back in the headwind. It's what I said at the start, you never know and this is not over before you pass the finish line. Next weekend, fits me better without so much climbing and so far it has been a pretty good Classics campaign and I would love to finish it off with a victory at Roubaix. Of all the Monuments, it's the one that I believe fits me the best but again, there's some pretty strong guys there again and it will be the same guys fighting for the win so, nothing is given and we keep fighting until Sunday.
I had said I was up for trying to jump away at the end, but with the headwind, I just couldn’t get away from the other three. So I decided to keep the pace high — that would suit Mads better in a sprint against Mathieu for the podium. But I think the strongest rider was at the front. We fought hard, and I felt like everyone had a rough patch on the various climbs, but it’s hard to analyse everything right now. After the Paterberg, I definitely wanted to do most of the work. I think I can head into next week with confidence.
