As is traditional, Plouay served as the start and finish venue for the Bretagne Classic. In the 90th edition of the French one-day race, the riders covered 228 kilometers. The succession of short climbs provided plenty of elevation gain.  

After the start, Sjoerd Bax, Markus Hoelgaard, and Alexy Faure Prost launched the first attack of the day. The trio set the pace at the front during the opening hours. Just after the halfway point, Baptiste Veistroffer and Emil Herzog joined them. As the race entered the local circuits in Plouay, the five riders’ advantage began to decrease.  

On the local circuit, the climbs followed in quick succession. More riders took their chances and tried to bridge across to the breakaway. With just under 60 kilometers to go, Per Strand Hagenes put in a strong effort on the Côte de Marta. His teammate Tim Rex used the opportunity to accelerate from the peloton, but he was unable to make the connection with the strong front group.  

On the following laps, Louis Barré made several attempts to create a gap on the Côte de Ty Marrec, but the 26-year-old Frenchman from Team Visma | Lease a Bike was not given any space. After an unpredictable race, the early breakaway riders were caught with five kilometers to go. At that point, several riders launched the decisive attack. Aranburu ultimately proved to be the strongest.  

“Our plan was to attack with 60 kilometers to go, and the guys executed that well,” Head of Racing Grischa Niermann said afterward. “To have a chance of winning, we needed to make the race hard. We certainly made things difficult for the others, but we’re going home without a result. Louis showed today that he is in good form, but unfortunately, he missed the decisive attack. We made our presence felt, but ultimately we were unable to play a significant role in the finale.”  

De Bretagne Classic was bovendien de laatste wedstrijd van Niermann in zijn rol binnen de ploeg. Hij was sinds 2017 actief als ploegleider en vervulde daarna de functie van Head of Racing. In die periode leverde hij een belangrijke bijdrage aan meerdere successen van de ploeg.