Gino Mäder gives £4000 to charity after pledging to donate for every rider he beat in Vuelta a España

Gino Mäder completed an astonishing display at the recent Vuelta a España, after he pledged to donate money to charity for each rider he beat at the race.

The Swiss rider has confirmed he will be donating €4529 (£3889.69).

Mäder (Bahrain Victorious) finished a surprising fifth overall as well as taking the best young rider's jersey, which he took off Egan Bernal on the penultimate day of racing.

The 24-year-old asked his fans on Twitter to suggest charities that he should donate to, with the most liked tweet deciding the organisation that would benefit. 

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On the final day of the Vuelta, Mäder decided that he would pay €10 for every rider he beat in the general classification, as well as €1 for every rider he beat on each stage.

He Tweeted after the race saying: "The Vuelta is done and dusted, it was a great experience and a race I’ll remember for a long long time! After going through all the comments, I found that Just Diggit was the most liked comment!

"As said in my previous tweet I’ll add €10 for every rider in GC too! Donation of €4529 will be done today! Thanks to all of you who supported me throughout this Vuelta! Recover and up we go to the next!"

The charity, Just Diggit is an Amsterdam-based organisation that aims to cool down the planet by restoring Africa's green spaces over the next 10 years. 

It has already restored 60,000 hectares and Mäder's donation will likely go some way to help them continue their vital work to save the planet from climate change.

The charity replied to Mäder's Tweet thanking him: "That's amazing, Gino! Congratulations on this outstanding performance and thank you for supporting us and our mission to cool down the planet. Together we can make the earth green and cool again!" 

Mäder has had an extremely successful season with Bahrain Victorious. Not only helping Jack Haig to a podium at the Vuelta and fifth overall himself, as well as the team classification, but he has also taken multiple top 10s and wins.

He burst onto the scene this season after he was pipped to a stage win by Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) in Paris-Nice. The Swiss climber put that behind him and pulled off a stage win at the Giro d'Italia as well as wearing the blue mountain's jersey before abandoning due to injury.

He also won the final stage of the Tour de Suisse where he out-sprinted Canadian star Michael Woods (Israel Start-Up Nation) from a late breakaway.

He is next due to race on Sunday, September 12 for his nation in the European Championships road race in the Trentino region of Italy.