Mads Pedersen soars to Victory on uphill finish In Montilla

Mads Pedersen (Trek-Segafredo) sprinted to stage 13 victory, gapping all the sprinters on the tough uphill finish into Montilla

A flat stage was made more arduous with high temperatures and strong winds.

Conditions were not unfavourable for a breakaway, only three riders got away; Julius van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost), Joan Bou (Euskaltel-Euskadi) and Ander Okamika (Burgos-BH).

The trio only built up a lead of arounf 2m 30s, leaving the peloton a day to recover ahead of the two mountain stages on the weekend.

Bou and Okamika resisted the surge of the peloton until 10 kilometers to go, but there was nothing to prevent a bunch sprint.

The teams occupied the entire width of the road into the final kilometers. INEOS, then Movistar then Jumbo-Visma set a high pace into the final kilometer, with all sprinters present near the front. 

Pascal Ackermann launched his sprint early in a bid to surprise his rivals, but he went too early, Mads Pedersen powered ahead with broad daylight between him and the rest of the field.

He crossed the line thrilled, with Bryan Coquard sprinting to second place and Pascal Ackermann managed to just hold on the third position. Tthe GC riders all arrived safely in the peloton.

“This is super nice. We knew that this final was super good for me, and the boys were super focused all day. I am just happy that I could finally get the win and give back the boys something back for all the work they did so far -it’s really nice for all of us.” said Pedersen

“Alex Kirsch delivered me in the last corner, so there was still 800m to go, so it was perfect that Jumbo-Visma made a good hard tempo and that Pascal Ackerman jumped early. It meant I could jump with him. It was a long, long sprint – a full sprint, so a 330m sprint today.”

“We came here for a stage win and now we have one. Now we keep fighting to get one. more. It’s super nice to have a comfortable lead in the jersey, but it still would have been nice to have Sam here to keep fighting for the jersey. if we keep fighting for the stages we will see how it goes.”

“We put pressure on the whole team today, and in the end, I had to deliver. A bit of pressure is always good, and it can give you an extra 10% in a finale like this. I like pressure like this and I like to give the guys back what they were working for. In the end, a pretty good day.”

VIDEO: Stage 13 Highlights

Stage 13 Top 10

1 DEN Mads Pedersen Trek-Segafredo 03:46:01
2 FRA Bryan Coquard Cofidis + 00
3 GER Pascal Ackermann UAE Team Emirates + 00
4 GBR Fred Wright Bahrain Victorious + 00
5 NED Danny van Poppel BORA-hansgrohe + 00
6 FRA Quentin Pacher Groupama-FDJ + 00
7 ESP Jesus Ezquerra Burgos-BH + 00
8 BEL Maxim Van Gils Lotto Soudal + 00
9 SLO Primoz Roglic Jumbo-Visma + 00
10 ESP Urko Berrade Equipo Kern Pharma + 00

GC after stage 13

01 BEL Remco Evenepoel Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl Team 48:11:10
02 SLO Primoz Roglic Jumbo-Visma + 02:41
03 ESP Enric Mas Movistar Team + 03:03
04 ESP Carlos Rodriguez INEOS Grenadiers + 04:06
05 ESP Juan Ayuso UAE Team Emirates + 04:53
06 NED Wilco Kelderman BORA-hansgrohe + 06:28
07 COL Miguel Ángel López Astana Qazaqstan Team + 06:56
08 POR Joao Almeida UAE Team Emirates + 07:18
09 SLO Jan Polanc UAE Team Emirates + 08:00
10 GBR Tao Geoghegan Hart INEOS Grenadiers + 08:05