"Way more than I ever dreamed about" - Mads Pedersen makes it a 3rd Giro d'Italia 2025 stage win with powerful uphill sprint

There's no doubting who the star of the first five stages has been at the 2025 Giro d'Italia. After a powerful uphill sprint on stage 5, the Danish leader of Lidl-Trek surged to a third stage win of the race already - this time in the Maglia Rosa.

"It was incredibly hard, the last 20km," reflected the 29-year-old Dane in his post-stage interview afterwards, having held off the late charges of Bahrain - Victorious' Edoardo Zambanini and Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team's Tom Pidcock in a real thriller of a finale in Matera. "I suffered really a lot in this last climb. This was a really, really tough one and I wasn't sure."

Even as the final climb began Pedersen was far from ideally placed. A massive effort, helped by some sterling work by Mathias Vacek saw the Maglia Rosa enter the finishing straight perfectly placed however. "I knew when I was a bit behind that, I was still in a group fighting for the win. But, I had a really hard time there, and I used a lot of energy to move back up to Vacek's wheel," he explains. "I had to spend energy just coming back to fight for the win, but yeah, luckily I had enough for the last sprint."

Whilst this is as mentioned, Pedersen's third win of the 2025 Giro d'Italia so far, this one is extra special for the Lidl-Trek leader, given the fact he took victory whilst wearing the Maglia Rosa. "It's really incredible," Pedersen concludes with a beaming smile. "To win in this jersey as well. It's insane. Way more than I ever dreamed about, so yeah, what a Giro we have had and what a team I have around me. Every day we try to win as much as possible, and yeah, we'll try again tomorrow."