Lidl-Trek's Skjelmose accuses Netcompany INEOS and Bahrain Victorious riders of 'dirty tactics' at the Vuelta

Mattias Skjelmose had the best result among the general classification contenders in the Vuelta a España on Friday. The Dane from Lidl-Trek slipped into the early breakaway and ultimately gained two minutes on his rivals, but it wasn’t without a struggle. Skjelmose gave his account of the race to the Danish network TV2 afterward.

Skjelmose was part of a group of 45 and gained two minutes, putting him just behind fifth-place Oscar Onley and sixth-place Jakob Ormzel. “That wasn’t the plan, but if you can get a free ride, you might as well take it,” Skjelmose said, explaining that it wasn’t exactly his intention to move up to the front.

"At the bottom of the descent, there was a small obstacle that we hit hard, and it didn't cost us anything. That's when I was told they were trying to block the road behind us, so I figured I should go check out what was going on," said Skjelmose. “I had to expend as little energy as possible and see what I could get out of it.”

Eventually, the breakaway group split up, and Skjelmose found himself on the wrong side, alongside riders from Netcompany INEOS and Bahrain Victorious—the teams of Onley and Ormzel. “I think there were some who weren’t too happy that I was there, and they resorted to some dirty tactics,” said Skjelmose.

"I don't think it would have turned out any differently. If I had been in the first group, a group would have set off without me anyway. INEOS and Bahrain were a little unhappy about it, but they could have just left if there had been a problem," he recounts.

It wasn't until the end that Skjelmose took the lead himself. “I didn't really take the lead until we got down to that flat section. I tried to make a couple of others—Berthet and Rodriguez—work as hard as possible.”

"At any rate, I did my best, but as I understood it, it was INEOS that kept making suicide pulls back there. So it's hard to gain much time. But I gained two minutes, and we can work with that," the Dane concludes.