Matteo Jorgenson (Movistar) saved his best performance for last in Paris-Nice, but left a bit of a bitter taste.

The American rider was unable to chase down Tadej Pogachar (UAE Team Emirates), who was running his own race, but crossed the Col d'Eze in the second group with Jonas Vingegaard, David Gaudou and Simon Yates.

They finished 33 seconds behind Pogachar and 10 seconds behind the next GC rider group, but Jorgenson felt he could have and should have made more. He was just one second short of Romain Bardet's seventh place overall, but he made it clear that he had even higher goals.

"I was really motivated and thought fifth place in GC was possible. I gave it my all." In the end, it wasn't enough."

Jorgenson told FloBikes.

Jorgenson explained that if his peers had approached the finale differently, it might have been enough. After climbing the final climb 45 seconds behind Pogachar, he was disappointed with the lack of cooperation on the descent to Nice.

"Everyone wasn't pulling hard. It's a little disappointing to me," Jorgenson said. [Yates in particular was skipping pulls and slowing the pack down every time he passed a pull. I know he wanted to win the last sprint, but he's already ......" He said.

"I was only 25-30 seconds off Tadej, so maybe if I pulled a little harder I could get him back and maybe win the sprint from there. But that's life. I just did my best."

After his victory in the Tour of Oman, Jorgenson's GC battle in Paris-Nice began with 12th in the Movistar team time trial, followed by 10th in the first summit finish at La Loge des Gardes, and then 9th at the Col de la Couillol on stage 7.

He revealed that he struggled in the heat of the Couillol, but corrected that on the final day to finish eighth, as he did two years ago.

"Yesterday I made a mistake with fueling in the heat. I didn't expect it to be hot and I didn't do the heat protocol the way I should have. That was bad," Jorgenson said. I overheated and dehydrated on the last climb, so I didn't perform well.

"Everything went well today. It was good that I had the legs, but it's very disappointing to finish in the same position on GC when I had the legs. That's life."