Mads Pedersen continued the winning streak for Trek-Segafredo when he sprinted home first from a reduced peloton on stage two of the Herald Sun Tour on Friday. It was the team’s sixth victory of the season. The Danish rider beat Steele Von Hoff (Bennelong SwissWellness Cycling Team) and Alexander Edmondson (Mitchelton-Scott) at the finish in Ballarat.
Trek-Segafredo had already captured two wins in Argentina and three in Mallorca – easily its best start to a season – and the riders competing in Australia were inspired to bring home another from Down Under.
“We missed the win yesterday, we were really close after doing a really good job so this morning when we had the [team] meeting we talked together, and we were really motivated to bring home a victory from Australia,” explained Pedersen.
Pedersen made certain of that at the end of the 198.6-kilometre race, unleashing a powerful kick to the line after a great leadout from Koen de Kort.
“The whole team did an amazing job today and Koen did a one-kilometre leadout! It was just the perfect day – we were always good, in the front, no stupid moves, no dangerous points for us, just really good all day. We have to keep up with what the team did in Argentina and Europe, so it was good to have a victory here also. Now we have six victories on the team -, that’s really nice.”
It was a straightforward stage with the Mitchelton-Scott team helping Trek-Segafredo control the breakaway until the leaders were contained ahead of the final obstacle of the day, the Buninyong climb.
Although not long, Buninyong topped out four kilometres from the finish and losing contact here could spell the end of the game for Pedersen.
“I was a little bit afraid of the climb in the finale, but I believed in it, and Alex (Frame) started to pull; the team was putting a little bit of pressure on me, and then I believed even more in it. I really thought I could survive the climb and I knew if I did, I had a really good chance to win the sprint.”
Following the wheel of trusted lieutenant de Kort, Pedersen made it over the climb, and then made good on sealing the team’s sixth win of the year.
Lasse Norman Hansen (Aqua Blue Sport) maintained his GC lead. Steele Von Hoff remains in second place 4″ behind with Cameron Meyer (Mitchelton-Scott) 9″ behind Hansen.
