Mathias Vacek was clearly the fastest on stage 1 at the ZLM Tour, winning the opening time trial ahead of Niklas Larsen and Lidl-Trek teammate Jakob Söderqvist.
Mathias Vacek has won the 21.1-kilometre opening time trial at the ZLM Tour in the Dutch town of Kapelle, Zeeland. The Czech ITT champion was 19.5 seconds faster than Denmark’s Niklas Larsen and now leads the five-day stage race comfortably.
Lidl-Trek dominated Stage 1, with Jakob Söderqvist finishing third, Max Walscheid fourth and Héctor Álvarez fifth in the time trial – 24, 25 and 26 seconds behind Vacek, respectively.
Edward Theuns finished 14th, while Thor Michielsen of the Future Racing squad was 19th. Otto Vergaerde, who saved his legs for the coming days, finished in 67th place.
The upcoming four stages will all be flat, but already on Stage 2 in Zeeland, the wind could be a huge factor. In general, the race will feature some really technical sections every day, with narrow roads and many corners.
Lidl-Trek will give it everything to defend the yellow jersey and make the most of their comfortable situation on the GC after Stage 1.
In Vacek’s words:
It was quite a nice TT I have to say – a bit of everything: Some technical parts and some long straights to push a lot of power. So I knew it could suite me and also in preparation for the World Championships it was a good one. So I really wanted to do well and go full. I'm really happy, that I could win here and gain some more confidence for the World Championships. The next stages will be quite hard, not parcours-wise, but for sure with the wind and the small roads, left and right it will be quite hectic. So for sure we'll have to watch out and be always in front. But now with quite a good gap I can really try to go for the GC and try to bring it home. It's a long way to go, but we have a good team here and I'm looking forward to the next stages.
