Paris-Nice: Mathieu Burgaudeau takes stunning solo win on stage 6

Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) managed to hold off the sprinters to take his first career victory on stage 6 of Paris-Nice after a late solo move in the final 10km.

The 23-year-old countered a late move by Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) to go solo into the final 10km, taking advantage of a short punchy climb. Behind, a disorganized peloton looked at each other for too long. The sprinters were right on Burgaudeau’s wheel as he crossed the line but the Frenchman hung on to deny Mads Pedersen (Trek-Segafredo) and Wout van Aert (Jumbo-Visma).

Primož Roglič stayed safe in the peloton and held onto his overall lead, and the yellow jersey.

The sixth stage of the 80th edition of Paris-Nice stayed in the mountains with a 213.6km route between Courthézon and Aubagne.

Only 111 riders started the stage after 23 riders abandoned at the start of stage 5, with a further 10 riders not starting on Friday.

Unlike yesterday, the break didn’t look like it was going to stay away, with mountains jersey wearer Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ) joined by Kazakhstani champion Yevgeniy Fedorov (Astana), Johan Jacobs (Movistar), Victor Koretzky (B&B Hotels), Julius van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost) and Sebastien Grignard (Lotto-Soudal) going clear.

The Intermarche-Wanty-Gobert, Cofidis and Trek-Segafredo led peloton only allowed the break around four minutes, with the gap being dragged down to two minutes with 76km to go.

Grignard was the first rider in the break to lose touch and drop back towards the peloton with 58km to go at the base of the penultimate climb. He was caught 4km later.

Moments later the break shattered with Madouas the first to drop back. But one of his mountain jersey rivals, Matt Holmes (Lotto-Soudal), kicked out of the peloton so Madouas followed.

Meanwhile, up front it was Jacobs and Koretzky who led with Van den Berg trying to bridge. Holmes swiftly dropped Madouas as he went in search of mountain points.

Danish powerhouse Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM) attempted to get away from the Trek-Segafredo led peloton. The 27-year-old took some exceptionally big risks on the tighter bends,, pulling out a big lead on the chasers going into the final 20km.

Kragh Andersen’s efforts saw a split in the peloton which included DSM’s sprinter Cees Bol and GC leader Andreas Leknessund.

He was brought back 5km later by Trek-Segafredo as the American-registered team looked to set up Pedersen.

Quinten Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) attacked with Christophe Laporte (Jumbo-Visma) following the intermediate sprint. Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) followed too as Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) kicked round them all to take the bonus seconds at the top.

Burgaudeau continued his efforts over the top as wave after wave of attacks came in the chasing bunch. However, they were all brought back as Burgaudeau extended his lead with 6km to go. It looked as though Jumbo-Visma and Trek-Segafredo had done enough to rescue the win but in the closing few meters Burgaudeau hung on for an unlikely but well-deserved win.

Stage 7 of the race sees the race head to its only summit finish with a 155.2km stage from Nice to the Col de Turini where the climbers will have their fun.