Megan Jastrab records America's highest-ever finish at Paris-Roubaix Femmes: 'I'm ecstatic'

Besides from Franziska Koch's superb win at Paris-Roubaix Femmes, there was another young rider who rode to their highest-ever finish in a Monument: UAE Team ADQ's Megan Jastrab.

Twenty-four-year-old Jastrab was towards the front of the race all day, and although she didn't made the decisive winning group that contained Koch, Marianne Vos and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, she attacked with Lotte Kopecky late on to ride to fifth place, the best-ever result for an American rider in the women's race.

More impressive is that Jastrab – who joined UAE this past winter after five seasons with Picnic PostNL – has been struggling with a wrist injury for the past six weeks, but she was able to tame the cobbles to finish just behind Kopecky in the velodrome.

"I’m ecstatic, exhausted – it's such a special race," Jastrab told Cycling Weekly at the finish, the first time she's finished in the-top 10 of Roubaix in her five participations.

"It’s really exciting. I’ve been chasing a win for my entire career, had a lot of top-fives now which is nice to be consistent and to show it, but fifth in a Monument is really special."

Above all, the result finally puts to bed a number of frustrating moments for Jastrab at the Hell of the North.

"I think in the last years I’ve always had some kind of bad luck every single race at Roubaix, so it’s a love-hate [relationship] in every edition, so finally I’ve had a bit of luck in this race.

"I came in with a lot of injuries. I didn’t know I was going to start because [at last week's Tour of] Flanders I went down really hard and I’ve had a wrist injury since a month-and-a-half that hasn’t healed. I’m really all taped up right now and I was in a lot of pain at the start.

"If I wasn’t in the front group I’d just stop because I was just doing more damage but today I was in the rhythm and it was special.

"I was only caught behind one or two crashes and I was always top position going into sectors and out of them so I avoided mostly everything."

When Koch, Vos, Ferrand-Prévot and Blanka Vas went up the road with just less than 50km to race, Jastrab knew her chances of winning were probably gone, but she was determined to race towards a top result.

"To be honest I knew it wasn’t going to come back," she said. "When the group went it was right on the crosswind split. I was there but I needed a bottle and they just went right over the top of that little kicker and I grabbed a bottle and they were a few bike lengths ahead.

"When you have such strong riders up the road going on a tail-crosswind most of the day, it’s very hard to bring it back. It was the same thing in Gent-Wevelgem. Koch, Pauline, Vas and Vos are very, very strong and experienced riders so they weren’t going to let it come back for a sprint.

"I felt so bad [in the final 10km] because she [Kopecky] was really trying to get me to pull and I was like, 'I am sorry, but you’re so much stronger than me!' I was just suffering so much. Even with three-and-a-half kilometres to go on the drag she was pulling full gas and I was like, ‘I’m about to get dropped, this is going to be so embarrassing’."

Jastrab wasn't distanced, though, and there was no shame in Kopecky beating her to fourth place.

The American will now rest up after a full-on spring campaign, taking with her memories of an action-packed Sunday in Hell.

"It’s so cool with the crowd and I know the live coverage wasn’t all there, and there was a lot of complaining, but I think with the crowds it was really special, to not hear you breathing, just the screaming from the fans on the side and I tried to enjoy it today," she said.

"It was nice not to think about the suffering but to enjoy the experience. To finish fifth in a Monument is really special."