Ilan Van Wilder won the first stage of the Deutschland Tour in the sprint of a top trio and is the new overall leader. Nils Politt was no longer able to keep up after the last climb on Thursday (08/24/2023).
Van Wilder, who also took the red jersey from the overall leader, prevailed against his companions Felix Großschartner and Pavel Sivakov, another group of three around Pello Bilbao crossed the finish line three seconds later. The best German was Nikias Arndt in ninth (+10 seconds), Politt crossed the finish line shortly afterwards and is now sixth in the overall standings, 19 seconds behind the leader.
Six drivers drive up to five minutes away
In the first part of the 178-kilometer stage, a leading group of six broke away from the peloton. Harm Vanhoucke (Lotto Dstny), Silas Koech (Saris Rouvy Sauerland), Oliver Mattheis, Jasper Levi Pahlke (both Bike Aid), Albert Gathemann (P&S Benotti) and Vincent John (Rad-Net Oßwald) drove the other drivers up to five minutes of which – 40 kilometers from the finish, however, their escape was ended.
The field went together in the very hilly final section of the first stage. The best drivers still rode together over the Ellerberg (1.7 kilometers with an average gradient of six percent), but as expected, sprinter Pascal Ackermann had to give up well before the finish. His dream of the red jersey – he was just eight seconds behind prologue winner Ethan Vernon – was shattered prematurely.
Decisive attack in the closing stages of the stage
After the summit of the last mountain classification, things got restless in the field, and there were repeated attacks that were far from promising. At 8.5 kilometers there were serious attacks from the Movistar team on the last climb, which also caused problems for Nils Politt. From this, the top group of three crystallized and sprinted for victory at the finish in Merzig.
“I went into the last hill in third place and Movistar went straight into it for the first few meters – I should have skipped that, following them there. We closed the hole again, but I couldn’t keep up with the counterattack“, said Politt and promised: “We lost valuable seconds today, but the Tour is not lost yet.”
Long before the end of the stage, Mads Pedersen, one of the favorites for overall victory, had to bury his ambitions. The ex-world champion, who was second in the prologue, had to give up with just 50 kilometers to go.