The Deutschland Tour has kicked off with a victory for Søren Wærenskjold. In an ultra-short prologue of 3.1 kilometers through the streets of Essen, the Uno-X rider narrowly edged out Samuel Watson. Wout van Aert finished fifth.
With riders like Wout van Aert, Jonathan Milan, Florian Lipowitz, and Matthew Brennan starting in Germany, the Lidl Deutschland Tour boasts a lineup to savor in the coming days. On Wednesday, all eyes were immediately on them in the prologue, but it would take a while before they truly had to perform. The absolute top contenders started last off the ramp.
This gave other riders the chance to taste the hot seat in the preceding hours. Early in the day, Marco Haller posted a top time of 3 minutes and 33 seconds, after which the Austrian stayed in the hot seat for quite some time. Haller surprisingly outpaced several specialists, such as Laurence Pithie (+1 second), Danny van Poppel (+1 second), and Maikel Zijlaard (+1 second), allowing the Tudor rider to dream of a stage win or at least a top placing.
photo:Cor Vos © 2025
Van Aert, Lipowitz, and Milan fall short of top time; Wærenskjold wins
Towards the end of the prologue, his time was beaten by a second by Søren Wærenskjold. However, the Uno-X rider still had competitors like Samuel Watson, Van Aert, Lipowitz, and Milan start after him.
Watson, at least, would not surpass Wærenskjold’s time. The Brit missed out by just half a second on toppling the Norwegian from the top spot... But could the three top riders do it? The answer was no! Among them, Van Aert came closest: he was 2 seconds off. As a result, Wærenskjold will start Thursday as the leader of the Deutschland Tour.
Lidl Deutschland Tour| Rank | Rider | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 03:31 | |
| 2 | + 01 | |
| 3 | + 02 | |
| 4 | + 03 | |
| 5 | " | |
| 6 | " | |
| 7 | " | |
| 8 | + 04 | |
| 9 | + 05 | |
| 10 | " |
