Hodeg wins Sparkassen Münsterland Giro

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Alvaro Hodeg (Deceuninck-QuickStep) won the rain-soaked Sparkassen Münsterland Giro one-day race, a bike throw to the line giving him a half-wheel advantage on Pascal Ackermann (Bora-Hansgrohe).

Belgian national champion Tim Merlier (Corendon-Circus) was third, with Fernando Gaviria (UAE Team Emirates) fourth in a hectic and high-speed sprint. Dylan Groenewegen (Jumbo-Visma) suffered a late punctured and did not contest the sprint.

A crash sparked by Hodeg's lead-out man with two hundred metres to go took down several riders and scattered others across the road. Florian Sénéchal seemed to blame Max Walscheid of Team Sunweb for the crash, hitting out at the German several times after the finish before his Deceuninck-QuickStep teammates dragged him away.

Hodeg was unsure if he had won but then celebrated with his teammates after being told he had taken his seventh victory of 2019. Deceuninck-QuickStep have now won 66 races so far this year, moving closer to the 73 victories of 2018.

"It's amazing to finish the season like this," Hodeg said after taking several drinks from a long glass of beer on the podium.

"I'm really happy because I had the support of team all day. It was a hard race and really, really cold, but I did my best. I like to race in the rain," he said.

"I didn't see the crash because I was in front. I knew I had to take the last corner in the top five because it would be hard to move back up in rain. We did that and then I won. At first I wasn't sure if I'd won, but I did. I trained hard for Worlds but it didn’t work out. This is some kind of compensation."

The 193km race around Munster was the first of many post-World Championships races as the European season winds down.

The race was the final outing for Andre Greipel in Arkea-Samsic colours and perhaps the last race of his long career. 

It was Mathieu van der Poel's last race of his road season before he focuses on cyclo-cross, and the Dutchman went on the attack with 75km to go, trying to chase down the early break of the race. He upped the speed with several big efforts but was never let go and only succeeded in bring the race back together, with Bora-Hansgrohe riding for Ackermann.

As the riders seemed to wait for a sprint finish, Brian van Goethem (Lotto Soudal) tried a solo attack with 20km to go. He had been in the early break of the day but refused to give up. 

It was a valiant effort, but the Belgian only served as bait for the sprinters' teams to chase. He refused to ease and was only caught with 400 metres to go as the sprint teams jostled for position on the rain-soaked streets of central Munster but was fortunate to avoid the crash sparked by Sénéchal.

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