Isaac del Toro made an audacious attack on stage 3 of the Lidl Deutschland Tour and regained the race leader’s jersey. The Mexican finished second to his good friend Giulio Pellizzari (Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) on Saturday afternoon, and moves into the race lead with a handsome advantage of 52 seconds.
It was a super team display from UAE Team Emirates-XRG, with the Emirati squad instrumental in setting up Del Toro’s move.
Earlier in the afternoon, Nils Politt and Vegard Stake Laengen had neutralised a dangerous breakaway of 12 riders, before the pair unleashed an infernal pace heading into the day’s toughest climb at 36km to go. Thanks to their efforts, António Morgado was at the head of the race to deliver the final stinging lead-out for Del Toro.
By the time the Mexican made his move, many of his direct rivals in the general classification had been dropped, and the 22-year-old was able to press on in search of the final remaining breakaway man, Nelson Oliveira (Movistar).
Oliveira was soon caught, and Pellizzari emerged from the peloton to join Del Toro and the Movistar rider at the head of proceedings. For a while the trio pushed on, before Oliveira ultimately had to yield to the pace.
Onwards, Pellizzari and Del Toro combined to share the workload and extend their advantage over those chasing from behind (including the race leader, Visma-Lease a Bike’s Louis Barré).
At the finish, Pellizzari rolled across the line to take the stage win, as Del Toro could settle for the big prize of moving into the race lead. The UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider now holds the blue jersey and will head into Sunday’s final stage intent on delivering the overall crown.
Del Toro: “We tried today, we knew it would be a special day. With the whole team we managed to make a proper good lead-out, and have it all in control. We can be super happy with the performance and thanks to the team, I came back into the leader’s jersey.
“If you see the parcours, it is not that simple to take away from the other riders. We decided to do it because a little bit before, everybody started to be a little bit too smart, and we knew we wanted to do something. We didn’t like to be in the defensive when we don’t even have the jersey. It was fun, we tried on the third-to-last climb, and it went ok!
“I hope to finish it off. It will be a tricky day tomorrow but we have the ambition to finish the job.”
Lidl Deutschland Tour 2026 stage 3 results:
- Giulio Pellizzari (Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) 4:03:44
- Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) s.t
- Marc Hirschi (Tudor Pro Cycling) +34″
Lidl Deutschland Tour 2026 general classification after stage 3:
- Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 14:02:12
- Louis Barré (Visma-Lease a Bike) +52″
- Marc Hirschi (Tudor Pro Cycling) +1:05
