The 40th Deutschland Tour has started exactly as planned for Isaac del Toro: The Mexican rider, representing Team UAE Emirates-XRG, took the 2.6 km prologue in the Hessian spa town of Bad Orb and secured the blue jersey of the overall leader. The top favorite, who finished third at this year’s Tour de France, left Paul Magnier (Soudal Quick-Step) trailing by two seconds — the Frenchman having recently claimed victory at the Cyclassics in Hamburg.
The best German in the technically demanding prologue was Tobias Müller (Unibet Rose Rockets) in tenth place, finishing seven seconds off the pace. Del Toro’s teammate Nils Politt, the German time trial champion, completed the course twelfth (+8 sec.), while John Degenkolb (Team Picnic PostNL) crossed the line in 16th place.
Bad Orb stays in the spotlight on Thursday: the spa town hosts the starting point of the first stage, a rolling 215.3 km route with two mountain classifications and around 3,200 metres of climbing through Bavaria to Schwäbisch Hall.
Over a total distance of 742.2 km, the race spans four federal states across five stages before the overall winner is crowned in Heilbronn on Sunday. The future of the race is now secured in the long term: organiser A.S.O. and the German federation German Cycling recently extended their partnership until 2050.