Skoda Tour de Luxembourg 2025 Stage 2

September 18, 2025 There are very few pure sprinters in the race but the ones who are present will have their chance today. The start in Remich is on the Moselle River right across the border with Germany. There are two categorized climbs in the first 50KM, each under 2.5KM at 6%, before the race heads West then cuts North through the countryside, skirting around the French border and up to Steinfort to the Belgian border for a bonus sprint. The last categorized climb summits with 45KM to go at the top of the Montée de Mariedallerhaff after 1.5KM at 6.3%. The riders enter a local circuit around the finish town of Mamer with 30KM to go for two 15KM laps. Each lap has a 2.5KM false flat at around 2.5% with the finish on the flat Route d'Arlon in Mamer. The race situation was not dissimilar to what we had yesterday. With 74KM to go, a group of seven riders had 2 minutes 15 seconds on the peloton being led by Groupama-FDJ and EF-Education EasyPost. The break consisted of Baptiste Gillet of Arkéa-B&B Hotels, Jonas Geens of Flanders-Baloise, Victor Papon of Wagner-Bazin WB, Pedro Pinto of Efapel, Loïc Bettendorff of Hrinkow Advarics, and yesterday's KOM challengers Malte Hellerup of ColoQuick and Mil Morang of the Luxembourg National Team. The chase was effective because with 46KM to go at the base of the Montée de Mariedallerhaff, the gap was down to 90 seconds. The break rode together up the Montée de Mariedallerhaff until 100M from the top when Hellerup and Morang went off for the KOM points. It was a dead even sprint but Morang took maximum points and as a result, he leads the competition by a single point and will wear the Mountains Leader's jersey tomorrow. When the riders entered the circuit, Alpecin-Deceuninck put a man in the chase and by the time the break arrived at the finish line for 2 laps to go, the peloton were just 45 seconds behind. Shortly after the bell, Efapel tried the same move they went for yesterday which was to spring a rider forward before the finale. This time it was Aleksandr Grigorev that went in pursuit of the remaining leaders. The dragging false flat through the farms out of Mamer required high sustained power which was too much for Grigorev and he was reabsorbed. There was a little bit of standoff in the peloton for who would put in the last effort to close down the break and the leaders were able to retain a 15 second lead through 10KM to go. Soudal Quickstep came to the front with five riders which was enough to bring the break back with 5KM remaining. The front of the peloton got very busy with Alpecin-Deceuninck, Lidl-Trek, Groupama-FDJ, Soudal Quickstep, and EF-Education EasyPost all battling to hold their spot. EF-Education EasyPost did a great job and led the bunch through the roundabouts and into the final 1KM. Decathlon AG2R came over the top for Andrea Vendrame but Marijn van den Berg of EF-Education EasyPost didn't panic and tucked in behind the Italian. Decathlon AG2R's lead out stalled. Van den Berg found himself on the front with 300M to go and had no choice but to start his sprint. He kept winding up the pace and looked to be fending off the rest but with 100M to go, he started to fade and Tom Donnenwirth of Groupama-FDJ and Vendrame were charging. Out of Vendrame's slipstream however came Mathieu Kockelmann of the Luxembourg National Team. He was patient and waited for just the right time. Kockelmann pulled ahead just 20M from the finish and hit the line first. He raised his arms to the sky in a real boon for the Luxembourg National Team. Vendrame took second with Donnenwirth in third. Van den Berg was the fastest on paper but hitting the front too early cost him the win and he had to settle for fifth on the day.