Mads Pedersen completed the Lidl-Trek domination of the Deutschland Tour by winning stage 4 and securing the overall title on the final day.
Danny van Poppel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) finished second and Luke Lamperti (Soudal-QuickStep) took third in Saarbrücken from the front group of nine riders.
Lidl-Trek swept all five days of racing, with Pedersen taking his second stage victory on Sunday to seal the GC. His teammate Jonathan Milan won the other three stages.
"It's always nice to win races and also GC and I am super happy to have another overall victory this year. It's nice and shows that after a hard time since the Tour and Olympics that the shape is still there so bring on the rest of the season," Pedersen said in a team statement at the end.
"The plan today was really dependent on the way the race developed and the condition but the most important thing was to keep the GC. I was also racing for that in the last kilometers to keep it together. You know maybe one guy attacks and he is the one who is on 25 seconds, but it is hard to know when the attacks keep going so, I actually just wanted it to be together for the sprint and then hope for the best and luckily it was enough today."
On the final circuits in Saarbrücken, Archie Ryan (EF Education-EasyPost) charged to the front on the 6% incline, Anders Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) grabbing his wheel in search for the 10 bonus seconds at the finish, and Pedersen closing behind for the final downhill 4km to the finish.
Florian Stork (Tudor Pro) then attacked with 2.5km to go and Pedersen again went into chase mode, stalked by Van Poppel and Johannessen. With his second place on the stage, Van Poppel moved to second overall, 22 seconds back of Pedersen, pushing Johannessen to third by one second.
Two riders struck out after the opening 2km in the 182.7km final stage, Max Walscheid (Jayco-AlUla) along with Joshua Huppertz (Lotto Kern-Haus PSD Bank). Another 8km on they were joined by Alberto Bruttomesso (Bahrain Victorious) and Oliver Mattheis (Bike Aid), and they charged ahead with 3 minutes to their advantage. They carved out a solid lead of close to 5 minutes, with Mattheis edging close to the GC lead, virtually.
Once on the climb of Ormesheim (1.8km à 7%) with under 40km to go, the breakaway of four allowed Javier Romo (Movistar) to join the fray. With 100km to go, the quintet held an advantage of 4:15.
Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe led the peloton in the chase as the final 50km was underway and the lead was cut in half, with Bruttomesso the first one to drop from the breakaway group. Another 15km later, Huppertz dropped away.
Passing the finish line in Saarbrücken for the first time with 15km to go, the trio of escapees held a gap that had dropped to under 30 seconds. Romo surged ahead with Mattheis for the remaining 12km, while behind Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) launched an attack from the chasing peloton, which spurred a mass reaction to keep everyone on guard.
Then with 8km to go, Simon Geschke (Team Germany) attacked, causing the home crowd to cheer loudly as Deutschland Tour could be his final competition before retirement. The move helped the peloton catch the breakaway, setting up a bunch sprint at the end.
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