Kopecky banks another tough race in the legs at Classique Paris-Chauny

The centenary edition of Classique Paris-Chauny played out in predictable fashion with a long game of cat & mouse unfolding between peloton and breakaway with the escapees belong swept up on the final lap of Chauny before the sprinters stormed into the limelight with Matyas Kopecky first home for Team Novo Nordisk.

Matyas Kopecky:

“The beginning was tough for some guys it started fast and straight onto the rolling roads, and it took almost 30km for the breakaway quartet to gain ground. After the move went it settled down until we hit the local laps of Chauny with around 70km to go, but even as the pace increased, I manage to stay in a good position over the two short climbs.”

“In the final I missed the legs to gain a higher placing. I feel like I can handle race increases more now for example, better than in Poland at the end of July, but I still need to retain more energy for that final burst at the end. It’s been great to get another hard ‘classic style’ race at over 200km against WorldTour competition in the legs through and I think that next season I will start to reap the benefits of this first year as a professional rider.”

Sports director Gennady Mikhaylov:

“We focused all our energies on trying to keep Andrea [Peron] and Matyas safe in the bunch and in a good position for what was always likely to turn into a bunch sprint finale, the idea being that we could have two options, our two fastest in the mix at the end.”

“Everything was going well until the closing circuits and things started to get more hectic as the speed increased, attacks started to spring from the front of the bunch and each time brought a general acceleration that started to string out the group and Matyas did very well to fight for his position with Andrea not far behind. The front split again in the last few kilometers and Matyas was only a few seconds off at the end.”