Catch up with all the action from Paris-Nice live and free nightly, or jump onto SBS On Demand for all the replays!
The former world champion beat promising Dutch sprinter Olav Kooij (Jumbo-Visma) and fellow Dane Magnus Cort (EF Education-EasyPost) to take the yellow jersey away from Tim Merlier (Soudal-QuickStep).
Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates), who again won the day’s intermediate sprint, is second overall, two seconds behind, ahead of a crucial team time trial tonight (AEDT).
Three kilometres into the stage, Jonas Gregaard (Uno-X Pro), already part of yesterday’s break with Paul Ourselin (TotalEnergies) was back in action, this time going solo for a long day at the front. The Dane took his gap to a maximum of for minutes and 25 seconds before the peloton, led by Merlier’s Soudal-QuickStep teammates decided it was enough.
With a lead settling at under three minutes, Gregaard came first at the top of the Category 3 Cote des Granges-le-Roi, to add three points to his KOM tally. The pack came within 25 seconds of the escapee before it finally regrouped and let Gregaard regain some of his lead. The Dane forged ahead to cross the top of Cote de Méréville (103.1km) ahead of the bunch to take his KOM lead to eight points.
With his KOM harvest completed, Gregaard waited for the pack and was reeled in with 53 kilometres to go.
Gregaard will keep the polka-dot jersey until Stage 4 since there are no KOM points on offer in stage 3’s team time trial. Gregaard was also voted the most aggressive rider of the stage. Dane has spent an impressive 229 kilometres at the front in the first two stages of the race.
In the last 50 kilometres, the pack geared up for the final sprint. On the only intermediate sprint of the day, Tadej Pogacar attempted the same move as the day before, going for the six seconds up for grabs. The UAE Emirates team leader beat Michael Matthews (Jayco-Alula) and Nathan van Hooydonck (Jumbo-Visma) on the line to snatch precious time ahead of Tuesday’s team time trial.
A crash took place under the flamme rouge, disorganising the final sprint which looked undecided before Mads Pedersen surged to take the day’s laurels by about two tyre widths.
“The first two days of Paris-Nice have not been typical [of the race] because normally you have crosswinds on a day like this and it would only be 20 guys at the finish. It’s a pity there wasn’t more crosswinds and then it would have been less hectic at the finish,” said Pedersen.
“(Olav) Kooij came f**king fast in the end, so it was tight at the end, really close in fact and I wasn’t sure I held on for the win and you don’t want to celebrate anything before you know it’s right. Kooij and some other guys came to congratulate me but it’s better to wait because you look like an idiot if you start to celebrate and then you are second.”
Pedersen not only stepped onto the podium as the winner of the stage but also as the new race leader. He will head into tonight’s team time trial with the yellow jersey on his back while also leading the Points Classification.
“It’s nice to wear a leader’s jersey but I know it’s on borrowed time. It’s nice to have tomorrow then I can have it in the wardrobe at home afterwards,” said Pedersen.
“It will also be good for the TTT to have it. We are here with (Mattias) Skjelmose to try to do GC so it will be really important tomorrow to do a good team time trial for him.
"It’s different because if he wasn’t here we would just cruise around and have some fun for 32 kilometres but now it’s going to be a tough one and it will be full focus for us. I am 100 per cent ready to sacrifice myself in yellow for Skjelmose tomorrow.”
In a change to the usual Team Time Trial format where all riders receive the finishing time of the fourth rider across the line, riders will receive their individual finishing time. This means teams can work together to create a maximum advantage before launching a GC hopeful off the front, or exploit other fresh and exciting race tactics in their quest for a stage or overall victory.
“For a team like us who is not normally in the top three teams at TTT, it can be a good new thing to try and maybe it can work out well for us that we do ‘suicide pulls’ in the end and then Skjelmose just has to sprint himself for the finish line,” said Pedersen.
“In the end, I don’t know, we never tried it before so we will see tomorrow (tonight AEDT) how it goes if it works well or not. I think it’s pretty nice from the organisers to try something new.”
Watch all the best cycling events in the world on SBS On Demand, with the Tour de France, Tour de France Femmes and much more.
