Mathieu Burgaudeau grabs 'magnificent' win from Mads Pedersen, Wout van Aert on Stage 6 of Paris-Nice

“Sometimes dreams do come true,” declared Eurosport’s Rob Hatch, as 23 year-old Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) held off a surging, swarming squad of secondary sprinters to take the first victory of his young career. And what a victory it was, the product of a late, opportunist attack combined with grit and determination in its most raw, compelling form. Burgaudeau was left empty but elated.

Burgaudeau had left it late. His opportunist attack was actually a counter, and came just before the bonus sprint on the final, uncategorised climb of the stage. The odds were against him, but odds are always defiable, if seldom defied.

A medium mountains day carried the race towards the Mediterranean sea. The longest stage of the race offered another run-in favourable towards faster men but, with 3000m of climbing in total, a profile perhaps too jagged for the fastest. With plenty of polka dots on offer, there was much to motivate the men of the mountains as well.

Of these Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ) was the rider most eager to scoop them up, and cement his position at the top of the standings ahead of the super-climbs to come over the weekend.

A strong headwind blunted early efforts to part company with the peloton but when Johan Jacobs (Movistar) was able to make a successful dart away, 12km into the stage, Madouas went in pursuit. The pair were then joined by Yevgeniy Fedorov (Astana-Qazaqstan), Julius Van den Berg (EF Education-Easypost) and Victor Koretzky (B&B-KTM). The break was secured by 10am, and the peloton began to soften the strain on their pedals.

Madouas’ brothers in arms were content enough to let him take the points in return for his doing at least his share of the work at the front. The Frenchman claimed the maximum five points on offer over the 10.4km Col de Murs. Back in the bunch, the race, and his team-mates, bid farewell to Fabio Jakobsen (QuickStep AlphaVinyl.) The Dutchman joined the 39 abandoners since Sunday’s start in Mantes-la-Ville, which had left a mere 115 riders rolling out of Courthézon.

The break’s lead topped out a few seconds shy of five minutes, on the lead-up to the intermediate sprint, where Madouas was content to concede the rewards to his colleagues. In the second hour of racing, their quintet covered an impressive 39.9km.

In the valley, the peloton began to get a grip on the gap, with Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert Matériaux doing the lion’s share of riding at the front. As the race entered the second 100km, and hit the category 2, Col de Sambuc, the break’s lead was down to three minutes. Madouas added five more to his KOM tally at the top, and another three over the Col des Portes.

With 75km of the stage remaining, between them Cofidis, Jumbo-Visma, Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert Matériaux and Trek-Segafredo brought the break’s advantage down to two minutes.

Madouas had enough left in his tank to make it over the penultimate climb, the Col de Pas de la Couelle, in first place, before bringing his efforts to a close at the foot of the day’s final ascent, the Col de l'Espigoulier (10.8km, 4.4%.)

With only three riders left out front, and their lead over the bunch at 35 seconds and falling, a new race began. Previous polka dot wearer, Matthew Holmes (Lotto-Soudal), sensed there was still something for him in this race and set off in pursuit of the depleted trio. 6km from the summit, Holmes made contact with what was then a duo of Jacobs and Koretzky.

It was a worthwhile effort from Holmes, as he was able to pull back 5 points on Madouas’ lead in the king of the mountains competition. Early on the descent, with 27km to go, all attackers, early and late, were back in the bunch.

As the race rolled down towards the med, Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM) tried his luck and eked out a small gap but, with several teams motivated to set up a sprint finale, it didn’t last long.

Into the final 10km and, with the race back together again, briefly the race looked like it might get out of control. With a reduced bunch sprint in the offing, Ineos Grenadiers were obliged to work, to pull things back for their nominated rider, Ethan Hayter. Jumbo Visma were on high alert, however, and race leader Primoz Roglic wasn’t missing a trick.

Until they - and everyone else - missed the crucial one.

An unclassified climb offering bonus seconds invited movement from Groupama FDJ’s Olivier Le Gac, to which Mathieu Burgaudeau, eager to take something out of the race for himself and his team, responded.

Burgaudeau rode alone for several kilometres, with an advantage that only looked dangerous in retrospect.

Only with 4km remaining, did his 20 second lead over the yellow jersey group begin to threaten the primacy of the big teams. Jumbo Visma and DSM offered their services to bring him back and 1500m later and Burgaudeau's advantage was halved. It halved again 500 metres later, but still the 23 year-old gave everything he had. All he could do was put his head down and ride.

He took the flamme rouge alone but, with 500m to go, the furious bunch was closing fast, sharing a shot with the man whose dreams they were about to crush. Except they didn’t. Because sometimes dreams do come true.

Stage 3 winner Mads Pederson (Trek Segafredo) was the best of the rest, close enough for no recordable gaps between him and Burgaudeau. Wout van Aert rounded out the top three.

1 - Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) 5h 33m 06s
2 - Mads Pedersen (Trek - Segafredo)
3 - Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo Visma)
4 - Biniam Girmay (Intermarché - Wanty - Gobert Matériaux)
5 - Bryan Coquard (Cofidis)
6 - Luka Mezgec (Team BikeExchange Jayco)
7 - Ivan Garcia Cortina (Movistar)
8 - Dorian Godon (AG2R Citroen)
9 - Florian Senechal (QuickStep - AlphaVinyl Team)
10 - Luca Mozzato (B&B Hotels KTM)

1 - Primoz Roglic (Team Jumbo Visma) 22h 23m 34s
2 - Simon Yates (Team BikeExchange Jayco) +00:39s
3 - Pierre Latour (TotalEnergies) +00:41s
4 - Daniel Felipe Martinez (Ineos Grenadiers) +00:56s
5 - Alexsandr Vlasov (Bora Hansgrohe) +00:59s
6 - Adam Yates (Ineos Grenadiers) +01:11s
7 - Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM) +01:26s
8 - Jack Haig (Bahrain Victorious) +01:35s
9 - Nairo Quintana (Team Arkea Samsic) +01:45s
10 - Ion Izaguirre Insausti (Cofidis) +02:01s

- - -

Stream top cycling action live and on-demand on discovery+