Cycling – The last “normal”: How Mads Pedersen shapes the Giro d’Italia

What has you not said about Mads Pedersen. At 1.80 meters, he was too big for cycling, with 70 kilograms too heavy for the mountains – and he had already won great things. Yes, after his surprise victory at the age of 23 at the rainy World Cup race in 2019 in Harrogate, when his young body still cope with all the dusting of the day best and he had a while in the sprint to the more experienced and final-fast Matteo Trentin, he couldn’t do much for a while.

End fast and persistent

Pedersen was considered a comet that appears once – and then glued. However, one has to know that in his generation with Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert there are two drivers with a similar mix of qualities: finally, but not a sprint specialist, persistent, but no mountain flea. And both are just better. Because superstar Tadej Pogačar also drives the classics, Pedersen remained the great success of the monuments of cycling. The Dane had to be satisfied with second to fourth places on the Flanders Tour and Paris-Roubaix behind the Dutch or the Slovenian, sometimes behind both. And the Belgian van Aert sometimes came to the finish line.

Now, at Giro d’Italia, Pedersen not only has Van Aert under control. In his two stage wins at the start in Albania, his team Lidl Trek at the mountains before the finish made the race so quickly that both the Belgian and the sprint specialists were brought to their limits.

Tempomacher

“Mads is so good in the mountains this year that you cannot break him at all and that he always comes across the top with the best 30 men,” praises his team -mate Patrick Konrad when “ND” appeals to the Austrian climber about the captain.

Pedersen also appreciates himself this season as the “best version of myself”. There are some reasons for this. This is how he has become more professional: He has been working with a nutritionist since 2024 – and also listens to him. “I’m not the guy who falls in love with a lot of details. I don’t care about my carbohydrate intake. I don’t screw around my bike like wild either. But I trust the experts around me and think they are the best in the world, «he describes his attitude. The approach that came out of fashion in this sport not to take care of irrelevant, but just to ride a bike leads to new successes at Pedersen in connection with the principle of delegating things.

Jerseys

Last year, the Dane celebrated overall victories on smaller tours such as the Germany Tour and the Tour de Provence. And he won the Sprinter classic Gent -Wevelgem. He repeated this success this year as well as victory in Provence; On the tour of the Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, he also landed on the podium. At the start of the Giro, the now 29-year-old was able to cover up the leadership jersey of a Grand Tour for the first time. “I made it a tradition of not washing the jerseys with which I won races, but only to smooth and hang up at home,” he revealed. Now some could be added. “After the day of rest there are a few days that are Mads. There he should defend Rosa, «his team -mate Konrad told” ND “.

Pedersensen’s top form this spring is also due to new training approaches. Height training camp is still not part of his program. “I hate to be on some bare mountains for weeks away from the family,” he emphasized his previous aversion, which also falls into the Old School category. But he tried out the latest cry of training: heat training in closed rooms. “This is also hideous. I would rather train outside seven hours a week. But heat training not only helps to adapt to hot competition days. It also increases your blood volume and thus your performance, «he said.

Error and wages

Heat training is the domestic alternative to height training, with similar effects on the blood parameters. And with one who has so far refused to refuse, the effects are apparently great. The Mads Pedersen of 2025 is just expecting expectations that were made after the sensation victory at the 2019 World Cup. This speaks for some mistakes in the past, but also for persistence.