A road world title, stage wins at each Grand Tour and 40 professional victories at some of the biggest races. This could be mistaken for the palmarès of a rider at the end of an illustrious career, but they actually detail what Mads Pederson has managed before turning 28.
Something is still missing for the brilliant Dane, however. That something is a Monument.
Cycling’s Monuments are the five most prestigious one-day races, steeped in history and battled out across the longest and hardest parcours. Few of the sport’s icons are missing from the winners list of these races – from Fausto Coppi and Eddy Merckx to Tadej Pogačar and Mathieu van der Poel – and winning even one can make an entire career or cement a legacy.
And that is why Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) would trade a whole season of success, including a Tour de France stage victory and completion of the Grand Tour stage win set at the Giro, for just one Monument victory to be indelibly marked onto his palmarès in 2024.
“There’s no doubt that I’m here to win bike races, but for next year, if I could change all the results I did this year for one Monument. Yeah, I would do it, 100%,” Pedersen told Cyclingnews at Lidl Trek’s December training camp.
Pedersen’s name is already in cycling’s history books, having claimed a one-day race that sits right at the top tier on the scale of importance, the World Championships road race in 2019. Considered a surprise for some at only 23, and not a pre-race favourite, Pedersen has gone on to establish himself indisputably as one of the best riders in the world.
There were signs that his talents were specifically suited to the most brutal days in the saddle the previous year, when he took second at the Tour of Flanders on his debut at the race in 2018. Only Niki Terpstra was better on that occasion, when Pedersen spent an arduous day in the early breakaway and, as a 22-year-old, gave everyone a preview of what was to come in the years following.
The common theme between these two early successes was that even for Pedersen himself it was an unexpected journey to the podium of the Monument in 2018 and to the very top step at the World Championships road race in 2019.
However, the first Dane to win the men’s road race at the World Championships is a much more assured rider today, aware of his talents and ability to beat the very best in the world. After all, he did just that on a rainy day in Yorkshire just over four years ago so now it can hardly be…
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