'I do belong here' - Megan Jastrab comes of age in the Classics

Looking beyond the finish line at Gent-Wevelgem, you could have been forgiven for thinking Megan Jastrab had won the race. She looked into the eyes of her DSM teammate Pfeiffer Georgi as if to ask if that had really just happened. 

"Oh my god," she exclaimed, before raising both hands to her head, twice, the disbelief not dissipating.

Marlen Reusser had long since sealed a solo victory but Jastrab had just won the sprint for second place. Not just that; she did so after bridging over to the chase group in the final 10km, then getting swamped by a bigger group inside the final kilometre, but still summoning the strongest sprint.

Though, it was the longer-term journey that made this feel like a victory. Jastrab claimed the world title – and the spotlight that goes with it – at the end of a storming first junior campaign in 2019 but the US rider has only recently found her feet at professional level. 

There's the obvious caveat of a global pandemic, but three and a half years still feels like a long time in professional cycling these days.

"A lot of thoughts start creeping in," Jastrab admitted, speaking to Cyclingnews in Wevelgem. "'Was I only good enough for the junior category? Am I not good enough for the elites?'

"I deal a lot with comparison because of my junior year but I lost my second junior year. I never got to race in the rainbow bands ever, even on the track. In 2020 COVID hit and I didn't do one road race all year and in 2021 I didn't race until August, so basically I was out of the peloton for a year and a half, and you lose a lot of skills, you lose that race craft, understanding how the peloton moves."

After that short first pro season with DSM, Jastrab finally got a full campaign under her belt in 2022, including appearances at Paris-Roubaix Femmes and the Giro Donne. She even bagged a couple of podiums at the MerXem Classic and the opening stage of the Tour of Scandinavia.

"You get these little hints and you're like 'no, I do belong here'," Jastrab, now 21, said.

"It just takes time to develop, and having the team and everyone back you and be like 'no you are good enough, you've got to keep putting in the work'. It's about taking that mentality forward, continually developing, and it coming together some day."

If it started to come together last year, Jastrab's pro career now appears to be taking off. Her Gent-Wevelgem podium came four days after an impressive display at Brugge-De Panne, where she placed fourth from the select group behind the solo winner, her teammate Georgi.

"De Panne was a big confidence booster. I don't think I missed an echelon, and I actually forced some of the echelons and it just felt amazing to be at that level," Jastrab said.

"Even Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, the results don't show it but I had a really good race there, doing the positioning throughout. And here I just had that confidence that if I keep fighting I can be there at the end."

Anyone who survived to the end of this sodden edition of Gent-Wevelgem can be said to have a stomach for the Classics, but with such a strong sprint at the end of such a gruelling race with its fair share of hills, it looks increasingly that these are the races that hold the most potential for Jastrab.

"This means a lot. It's a major Classic, and it's my second year racing the Classics in the elites, so it's a big deal to do this," she said.

"Last year I was actually out of the time limit," she added. "I didn't think I'd make it over the climbs today but the team had a lot of confidence in me and Pfeiffer to be the leaders. To actually do it is really exciting."

Jastrab praised Georgi, who endured two crashes and bike changes, as well as the whole of her DSM team who have caught the eye as a collective this season.

"Everyone is willing to die for the others. We all get along and we give 100% in every race," she said. "We have so many cards to play, so we go in with an open mindset, but if someone is a team leader everyone goes all-in for that leader."

Jastrab will now turn her focus to her debut Tour of Flanders on Sunday and her second Paris-Roubaix a week after that, with ambitions naturally starting to shift upwards. She dutifully towed the party line that victory is what matters to the team – and those may well now start to flow for Jastrab herself – but she was still able to savour this moment.

"Second place today, I take it as a win personally."