Mads Pedersen stunned the field with a last-minute move inside the final kilometer of Bemer Cyclassics to take victory in Hamburg. With three escapees up the road, heading to victory, Mads took matters into his own hands, jumping from the peloton to catch the lead trio before passing them in a final push to the line.
Mads Pedersen:
“I was really on the limit on the last climb and I was going backwards. The guys did a great job to keep pulling me from one group to another as long as they could, to put me in a good position in view of the final.
Bora actually played the strategy very well with Politt in the front group and two riders slowing down the chase at the head of the peloton. I thought ‘shit, if they do like this at 1K to go we’re not gonna catch them’.
With a bit less than 1km to go we had a slight right, left. I decided to attack and try to get across, in the worst case I’ll pop and get nothing. But the other solution was to sprint for fourth and I don’t know if I would have been the fastest sprinter today. I gambled and hoped for the best and luckily it was enough. The whole peloton came super close in the end. Anyway, it was enough to keep them behind.
I just went and hoped for the best like the TT yesterday. At the finish Danny van Poppel came really fast with much more speed, so five meters after the finish line he was already two bike lengths ahead of me. I was 99% sure I had won, so I celebrated like a win. On TV it looks good, right?
I started to feel the legs, it’s a long season now and until now it’s been hard and I can feel it. Luckily there’s still some gas in the tank and now we go onto Germany and take it from there.”
