German Road Championships: Franziska Koch overcomes three-on-one situation to defend road race title

Defending champion Franziska Koch (Picnic PostNL) overcame a three-on-one situation to retain her German national championships road race title, launching a solo attack from a group with three Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto riders to win in Linden.

Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto) finished second, 14 seconds behind Koch, whilst her teammate Rosa Klöser took third, 43 seconds down. The third Canyon rider, Justyna Czapla, took fourth.

The race, set on hilly laps, had been aggressive and breaking up all day long. Koch had initially found herself in a leading duo with Niedermaier, and when they were joined by Klöser and Czapla, it looked difficult for her to crack the Canyon domination, but she did, attacking on the final uphill section and going solo to vicotry.

With action kicking off early on the laps, the race completely exploded, with the leaders riding everyone out of the race, exemplified by the fact that fifth-placed Liane Lippert (Movistar) finished 4:47 down on the winner.

This is Koch's second consecutive German road race title, after outsprinting Lippert to win the jersey in 2024.

German squad Canyon-SRAM were the biggest team in the race, with Niedermaier trying to do the double after her time trial victory, but despite their strength in numbers, they couldn't better the acceleration power from Koch.

Results

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