Tim Merlier, yesterday’s winner, and Arnaud De Lie were well down. Mads Pedersen managed to finish his team’s work by crossing the line first. From then on the sprinter’s teams tried to put their lead-out trains at the front. Pogačar beat Michael Matthews and Vingegaard’s teammate Nathan Van Hooydonck, who was there to try to prevent the Slovenian from taking all bonus seconds. It was full speed to the finish, but before the sprinters could fight for the victory, there was an intermediate sprint 13 kilometres from the finish. The Frenchman, who attacked in the opening stage with Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard, crashed but managed to continue. The peloton stayed together, apart from Pierre Latour. With 54 kilometres to go, the Dane was caught by the peloton. Gregaard’s advantage quickly disappeared. A few riders were in trouble, but everything came back together. The 26 year-old Dane had a lead of more than 4 minutes on the peloton, where the wind caused some problems with 75 kilometres to go. Jonas Gregaard (Uno-X) went away on his own. There was little enthusiasm for an early break. A sprint seemed most likely at the end of 163 kilometres. Between Bazainville and Fontainebleau, the riders had two climbs, but they were not too hard and were far from the finish. This also creates pressure.”Īfter Tim Merlier opened Paris-Nice on Sunday with a sprint victory, there was a chance for revenge on Monday. This was my first race where I was co-leader, next to Tiesj. When someone has to do the work, many teams look to us to bring back a leading group. “You have to steer an active course and make active decisions. Tiesj even said that this ‘disappointment’ could be a good thing, because if he had won the race, we would not have solved our problems properly.”Īccording to Valter, racing at Jumbo-Visma is also very different from Groupama-FDJ. We had a positive discussion about what we could have done differently. After the race he told me his vision and I told him mine. “He (Benoot) wanted us both on the podium. We wanted to ride a fast pace on the climbs, while Tiesj and Mohorič tried it with surprise attacks.”īenoot never asked Valter to sacrifice himself, according to Valter. My style is slightly different, more similar to what Madouas and Costa did. In Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne we saw that this worked well. He wanted to attack from behind and did this very cleverly. The Hungarian, new to Jumbo-Visma, says he has a different way of racing than Benoot. Valter and Benoot trained together a lot in Tenerife in the run-up to the season. Benoot responded that there was nothing to apologise for, that both had made mistakes, and that they would either move on or discuss it on the bus. I was even a little surprised that he thought I would do something like that.” Immediately after the finish there was a discussion between Valter and Benoot, in which the Hungarian said he apologised for his mistakes. Valter acknowledges that he also has ambitions of his own. This would have been selfish on my part.” Of course I make mistakes, but this wouldn’t have been a mistake. Jumbo-Visma is not the team that does such things and I am not that kind of person either. I didn’t even think for a second that he thought I brought the group back. “I did not see Tiesj’s hand gesture, but later it became clear that he had misunderstood the situation. This was also clearly visible on television.” “I waited until the rest were tired from the effort on the penultimate gravel sector and when I saw that they were struggling, I jumped alone to the group with Benoot. “That would have been amateurish,” continued the Hungarian. “Obviously I didn’t bring the group back,” said Valter. Benoot made an angry gesture when Valter closed a gap to the Belgian in the final and seemed to take some competitors with him. In conversation with Eurosport Hungary, Attila Valter spoke about the ‘misunderstanding’ between himself and his teammate Tiesj Benoot in last Saturday’s Strade Bianche. TOP STORY: Attila Valter “I am not a selfish rider” Go deeper and get interactive with live polls & quizzes, plus rider profiles, race updates, results & more – plus stream original and exclusive cycling documentaries. You can watch the most comprehensive live & ad-free coverage of the Spring Classics on GCN+.
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