It's been a slow start to the season for Team DSM, which has spent the early part of the season with no podiums in sight, let alone a win. However, Scheldeprij and newcomer Sam Welsford, both recent circuit-turned-road Aussie riders, scored their first top-three finishes as road professionals in a rain-soaked mid-week classic race.

The 26-year-old Olympic track bronze and silver medalist and 2020 Australian criterium champion was in the chase group behind Alexander Kristoff (Intermarque Wantigover), the lone Scheldeprij winner. Danny van Poppel (Bora-Hansgrohe) won the sprint from the chase group to take second place, and Welsford was the only rider able to hold onto his wheel.

"Going into the last local lap, we started attacking and we didn't want to miss any moves. We were not going to miss any moves," said Welsford in a statement to the media from Team DSM, "but we were able to get a good start. We were fortunate to hold onto third place for the long ride." [If we keep moving forward and keep racing like this, we'll be close to the top step.

Teammate Casper van Uden also led the pack, including defending champions Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin Phoenix) and Sam Bennett (Bora-Hansgrohe), to finish fourth. The 198.7-km-long Dutch Pro Series was a departure from the usual group finish, as echelons formed along with the elite group in the strong winds of the Zeeland region.

"It was a hard race from start to finish. We had three guys in the lead group of 17, but unfortunately we lost Cees (Boels) to a puncture."

"Sam and Casper did a really good job at the front. There were a lot of fast riders in the first group, so we had to be sharp and gamble on who would react and who would not. But we raced for the win until the end, and after such a hard race we came home in third and fourth, so we have to be happy."

"I am very happy with the way we finished the race.

Despite the podium finish, it was a very slow start to the season for the team. Judging by last year's level, they won half as many races as they did the year before and were last among the WorldTour teams; at the end of March 2021, Seth Boels took the team's first win in the second stage of Paris-Nice, and Marius Mayrhofer made the podium in the Settimana Coppi e Bartali.

In addition, the team, which has seen a number of high-profile departures in recent seasons, has moved Michael Stohler to Groupama-FDJ for 2022. However, judging by how quickly Welsford has adapted to a full-time focus on road racing, Team DSM may have found another Australian rider to contribute to its win total.