"I’d rather take a gamble and win than settle for second" - Jasper Philipsen criticises Soudal - Quick-Step for lack of chase at Gent Wevelgem 2025
Cycling
Mads Pedersen soloed for more than 55 kilometres to a stunning Gent Wevelgem win on Sunday afternoon in Belgium. Could the chasing pack have done more to hunt down the Dane though? According to Jasper Philipsen, the lack of impetus from Soudal - Quick-Step is mostly to blame for the disrupted and disorganised chasing of Pedersen.
"On the final climb of the Kemmelberg, I tried to create a small split. With a small group, it might have been easier to close the gap to Pedersen," recalls the Alpecin-Deceuninck leader in a post-race interview, with quotes collected by Sporza. "Maybe it was a shame that Soudal-Quick Step didn't add another rider to the chase because, in the end, they still did a lead-out for Tim Merlier with just three riders."
For the most part, it was Philipsen's Alpecin-Deceuninck teammates that led the chase. As they burnt through riders and no one else offered to help though, Philipsen was soon left isolated in the bunch. "At that point, I had no one left because everyone had been used up. I’d rather take a gamble and win than settle for second," said Philipsen. "I would have liked to have sprinted for the podium, but I got boxed in on the left side. Then I let it go. The win was no longer possible, and that’s what we came here for."
At one point it did look like Philipsen could dream of more, as he followed Pedersen's inital move. Sadly though, disaster struck at the most inopportune time with a puncture. "When you see how far he went... truly impressive," Philipsen says of the incident. "It was a very long race with a lot of headwind, so it's a crazy performance to do that on your own."
"On the first pass of the Kemmelberg, I felt good: I could keep up without going beyond my limit. By the end, my best legs were gone, but I think that was the case for everyone," Philipsen concludes. "It would have been a battle of attrition anyway, but you never know how the race would have evolved. The Kemmelberg really took its toll on the legs. I would have liked to have been with them, and maybe we would have had a completely different race. But it didn’t turn out that way."
Read also
Chapeau to Mads Pedersen here today at Gent Wevelgem - criticised at E3, he's gone hard and solo before the Kemmelberg and held off the peloton to retain his 2024 title 👏🇩🇰#GW25 #GWmen pic.twitter.com/ngAliY9spX
— Mathew Mitchell (@MatMitchell30) March 30, 2025
Kieran WoodDeputy Editor-in-Chief
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He regularly contributes to DartsNews.com and CyclingUpToDate.com, where he covers professional cycling and darts. In cycling, his work includes liveblogs from major races, including the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia, and La Vuelta a España, alongside race reports and analysis. He has also conducted interviews with professional riders.
His reporting spans the full racing calendar, from one-day classics to stage races, with a focus on accurate, real-time coverage and clear contextual analysis. For statistics, results, and historical context, he regularly uses resources such as ProCyclingStats. To support reporting on rider activity and training context where relevant, he also references Strava.
In his work, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles as new, verified information becomes available.
claps 0visitors 0
Just in
Popular news
Latest comments
- You can clearly see the the posture change from slightly sitting to again out of the saddle while changing of gears in the video of the sprintabstractengineer08-11-2026
- He has already beaten Pogi twice in the TDF. the achievement is over. He cannot beat Pogi now and he only has a few years left at the top. Win Giro and compete in the TDF, maximise palmares.abstractengineer08-11-2026
- Just looked again at the photo. Yeah I stand by that. If MS had fallen over in Brands direction I don’t even think she would have hit her. You must be a UCI race commissioner. I’ll be sure to check my sock height should I ever see you on a ride. Looks like everyone else on here sees what I see.mij08-11-2026
- I said looking at the photo it doesn’t appear she deviated. Chill out, not stating my word is the final judgement. Just commenting that based on the photo I don’t see it. And BTW the Dutch coach even said she didn’t impede her.mij08-11-2026
- Blah Blah Blah !frieders308-11-2026
- MS said she was changing gears so that caused her slight deviation. Nothing was intentional.frieders308-11-2026
- How can you use a photo post incident to judge the incident itself (which is not hard to find if you’re prepared to invest the same amount of time in searching as writing that comment? It’s harsh but technically right even though this or worse is not always sanctioned in every race. The two things that went against MS (who unfortunately for her would still have won without making her mistake) are that it was not a bunch sprint where there could have been an overlooked incident or mitigating circumstances explaining a deviation. Everything was focused on just those 2, Schreiber was riding beautifully balanced which made her sudden deviation look unnatural stroke as if it could have been in some part intentional whilst she was slowly drifting ever closer towards the barrier to a point that would have reached obstruction level. In her defence, it might have been the realisation she was heading towards that that made her react suddenly and caused the deviation involuntarily. In any case, congratulations to her for the ride of her life, in people’s minds she will be credited for it.Jumpyjohn07-11-2026
- Good boy Obviously doesn’t need that much help dealing with pressure, as some have suggested. Wiser (and humbler) than many far further along their careers. About offering him the moon, recently someone came up with an explanation of the downfall of a football great (either referring to Maradona or Portuguese Ronaldo) saying it was kind of normal after coming back from the moon, except that others, including some who actually did go to the moon like Armstrong (Neil in case anyone is too switched off to realise) didn’t go through any of the same motions after coming back. A lot of how you deal with situations has less to do with the situation than with your character.Jumpyjohn07-11-2026
- I think that they're not really used to dealing with this type of incident in a cyclocross race, and the situation has been magnified because it was a race for a championship title. It's very unfortunate that the race had to be decided in this way.
santiagobenites07-11-2026 - Seriously why do they keep doing stupid things like this. Its one thing to relegate when the placings are minor, when the action is blatant. But when it is ambiguous, why dont they at least take advice from some higher up to avoid embarrassing themselves. This is similar to the Halland goal when his teammate was clearly offside and interfered in play and VAR gave them the goal. if you dont have evidence you cannot convict. Even for doping they have these rulesabstractengineer07-11-2026
Loading
Write a comment