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.

Ad/> 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.

Paris — NiceMcNulty eases to Stage 5 victory to continue UAE Team Emirates dominanceYESTERDAY AT 15:37 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).