Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) claimed the whole win in the second one version of the Madrid Criterium by means of profitable the street race and completing 2nd within the removal race.
The sector champion emerged from a bunch of six riders at the Calle Gran Vía circuit to win the street race in entrance of a crowd estimated at a thousand robust. Spanish stars Juan Ayuso (UAE Workforce Emirates) and Omar Fraile (Ineos Grenadiers) completed 2nd and 3rd respectively.
It was once the primary time in his skilled profession that Van der Poel coated up for a race in Spain.
“It is truly really nice to be right here, with a large number of other people. I loved it and the ambience was once excellent. The direction was once onerous, very brief and intense,” Van der Poel advised the media after the development.
Even though closing 12 months’s winner Tadej Pogačar didn’t participate within the tournament, his UAE Workforce Emirates teammates Ayuso and Marc Soler took the beginning for the 25 parade laps within the town centre
The small peloton additionally incorporated fan favourites Luis Léon Sánchez (Astana Qazaqstan), Juan Pedro López (Lidl-Trek), Cristian Rodríguez (Arkéa-Samsic) and Movistar’s Oier Lazkano and Carlos Verona.
Sánchez, who is retiring after a 20-year skilled profession on the finish of 2023, was once celebrated by means of the riders who raised their bicycles in a guard of honour as he made his solution to the place to begin. The Spanish stalwart’s palmares come with 47 UCI victories and 31 Grand Excursion appearances.
“It’s been one of the particular moments of my profession,” Sánchez advised MARCA.
To the satisfaction of fanatics, Sánchez nabbed the victory within the removal race held at the identical direction forward of Van der Poel and Lazkano sooner than the street race.
In a birthday celebration of biking, fanatics coated as much as get autographs from Van der Poel and Spanish biking legend Alberto Contador on the Plaza del Calla on Sunday morning.