Mats Pedersen takes Stage 3 victory at Paris-Nice as leader Christophe Laporte crashes on home straight

A classics-style Stage 3 ended in a slimline bunch finish, with the 2019 World Champion, Mads Pedersen, able to outsprint Wout van Aert (Jumbo Visma), to take Trek-Segafredo’s first WorldTour win in nine months.

The second longest stage of the week took the race from the still somewhat northern Vierizon, in the Loire Valley, to the commune of Dun-le-Palestel in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region. While far from the most mountainous, it had enough about it to tempt the breakaway king, Thomas De Gent, into trying his luck. After a short-lived six-man attack came to nothing the Lotto Soudal rider, along with Owain Doull (EF Education-Easy Post) and Alexis Gougeard (B&B Hotels-KTM), were able to complete a conscious uncoupling from the peloton.

The trio’s lead topped out at just under five minutes, before the peloton decided to begin the very gradual process of bringing it back. Gougeard, second in the king of the mountains competition at the start of the day, had his eyes on a certain polka prize. De Gendt might have been expected to defer to Gougeard, while prioritising the stage win for himself. Over the first climb, however, the Côte d'Éguzon, it was the Belgian who took maximum three points, the Frenchman only able to add one to his tally. It was the same order over the 2.1km Côte de Crozant, with De Gendt playing the perfect team-mate to Matt Holmes, defending the jersey on behalf of the British incumbent back in the bunch.

The break’s day was done with 24km to go, at the foot of the Côte de Le Peyroux. With sprinters being spat out the back of the bunch, Groupama FDJ’s Kevin Geniets went on the attack with Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) countering. Burgaudeau was not out front for long, but long enough to take maximum mountains points, and keep the jersey on the back of Matthew Holmes for another day.

The second intermediate sprint was a contested one, with Pierre Latour (TotalEnergies), the best placed non-Jumbo Visma rider, keen to claim back bonus seconds. Primoz Roglic made a last ditch effort to deny the Frenchman, but could only add two to his total, while Latour did enough for the three.

15km to go found the yellow jersey, Christophe Laporte, pulling on the front of a peloton, shorn of its purest sprinters. Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin Fenix) was well-placed and, at that point, the fastest on-paper finisher of those remaining. Bryan Coquard, in revived form since his arrival at Cofidis, and former world champion Mads Pederson were also among the unshakables. The big teams kept up a strong pace in the final ten kilometres, in an effort to deter late attacks and ensure the race finished in one piece. They weren’t able to completely deter Soren Kragh Andersen, though. With 7km to go, on the last uncategorised climb, the Dane was briefly able to gain a handful of seconds over the bunch, before being returned to the fold.

At 4km from the line it was Movistar stringing things out, all their hopes resting on the shoulders of Ivan Garcia Cortina. The yellow jersey, Christophe Laporte went under the flamme rouge to ensure, barring disaster or a team-mate’s triumph, he would keep the race lead for another day. As the sprint was launched a sideways bump by Anthony Geniez did indeed him to the deck, but the Frenchman was quickly back on his feet, with only the only visible injuries to his modesty.

A few lengths ahead, off the wheel of a powerful lead-out by team-mate Jasper Stuyven, it was Mads Pederson who launched his sprint first, with 300m to go. Though Wout van Aert and Coquard locked on, no-one had enough to come round him and the win was his.

"We missed out yesterday with a bit of bad luck and we wanted to make it up today," said Pedersen. "The boys did a fantastic job all day to make it as easy as possible for me and it was a perfect lead out and a good sprint in the end.

Second place for Van Aert meant he was able to reduce the GC deficit to his team-mate, Laporte, to a single second, while overhauling him in the points competition. Stan DeWulf (AG2R Citroen) retains the best young rider’s jersey.

1 - Mads Pedersen (Trek - Segafredo) 4h 23m 29s
2 - Bryan Coquard (Cofidis)
3 - Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo Visma)
4 - Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin Fenix)
5 - Anthony Turgis (TotalEnergies)
6 - Biniam Girmay (Intermarché - Wanty - Gobert Matériaux)
7 - Fred Wright (Bahrain Victorious)
8 - Danny van Poppel (Bora Hansgrohe)
9 - Ethan Hayter (Ineos Grenadiers)
10 - Juan Sebastian Molano (UAE Team Emirates)

1 - Christophe Laporte (Team Jumbo Visma) 11h 34m 44s
2 - Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo Visma) +0:01s
3 - Primoz Roglic (Team Jumbo Visma) +0:09s
4 - Mads Pedersen (Trek - Segafredo) +0:29s
5 - Bryan Coquard (Cofidis) +0:33s
6 - Pierre Latour (TotalEnergies)
7 - Zdenek Stybar (Quick-Step AlphaVinyl Team) +0:38s
8 - Jasper Stuyven (Trek - Segafredo) +0:39s
9 - Alexsandr Vlasov (Bora Hansgrohe)
10 - Florian Senechal (Quick-Step AlphaVinyl Team)