Tour de Hongrie

Lopez won the centenary Tour de Hongrie

Colombian Juan Sebastian Molano (UAE Team Emirates XRG) won the last stage of the 46th Tour de Hongrie in Esztergom. Ecuador's Harold Martin Lopez (XDS Astana) retained the yellow jersey in the general classification.

Cool, rainy and changeable weather greeted the peloton of Tour de Hongrie in Etyek on 18th May. On the last day of the race, 170 kilometres, three categorised climbs and the cobbled section of the Esztergom circuit awaited the riders. With only 13 seconds separating the top three in the overall standings, Harold Martin Lopez (XDS Astana), Alessandro Covi (UAE Team Emirates XRG) and Albert Withen Philipsen (Lidl-Trek), it was set to be an exciting and unpredictable day. Zoltán Tessely, Member of Parliament and stage patron; Dr. Gábor Horváth, Member of Etyek Municipality; György Fülöp, Project Manager of the National Event Management Agency (NRÜ) and Károly Eisenkrammer, General Director, cut the ribbon at the start.

The pace was really high from the beginning as the GC favourites were trying to collect the bonus seconds of the intermediate sprint in Zsámbék. In the end, Lidl - Trek did their best, with Withen Philipsen gaining 3 seconds and teammate Teutenberg taking second place ahead of the rivals. After that, the breakaway of the day was formed, which included Zétény Szijártó (Team United Shipping), Owen Geleijn and Baptiste Huyet (Unibet Tietema Rockets), Jakub Otruba (Caja Rural - Seguros RGA), Luca Colnaghi (VF Group - Bardiani CSF - Faizane), Tord Wikander (Epronex - Hungary) and Siebe Deweirdt (Flanders - Baloise) in the Red Jersey.

Deweirdt clearly attacked for the mountain points, and his efforts were crowned with success: he took the second category climbs in Pilisszántó and secured his second consecutive mountains classification victory. The breakaway's lead peaked at 5 minutes, but after the last lap of Pilisszántó the gap started to narrow dramatically. At the back, first Euskaltel - Euskadi and then Erik Fetter (Team United Shipping) tried to attack, but the peloton blocked all their efforts. The Pilis circuit proved to be non-selective, with the best sprinters also enduring the climbs.

In the 8 km circuit of Esztergom, the peloton broke into pieces, with the duo of Jakub Otruba and Owen Geleijn leading the way for the final lap until the last km. Alessandro Covi collected another bonus second to reduce his gap to 7 seconds. In the uphill, cobbled finish, it was the sprinters who fought for the stage win, with Juan Sebastian Molano (UAE Team Emirates XRG) getting a superb lead from teammate Ivo Oliveira to win the final stage. Second was Danny van Poppel (Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe) in the green jersey, third was Tim Torn Teutenberg (Lidl - Trek).

The GC favourites crossed the finish line together, and Ecuador's Harold Martin López (XDS Astana) became the winner of the centenary Tour de Hongrie. Alessandro Covi (UAE Team Emirates XRG) was second, Albert Withen Philipsen (Lidl - Trek) third.

The green jersey went to Danny van Poppel, who took two stage wins and two runner-up finishes to take the points' classification by a comfortable margin. Siebe Deweirdt (Flanders - Baloise) took the red jersey again thanks to another excellent breakaway - the Belgian team's third mountains classification victory in the last four years. The best Hungarian was 19 years old Bálint Feldhoffer (Team United Shipping), who finished 7th overall, 27 seconds behind the Lopez, and thus won the White Jersey.