In the relatively short first stage, the race broke open early on. A large group of about thirty riders broke away from the peloton and quickly gained a large lead. In addition to Lemmen, Tijmen Graat was also part of the breakaway, which received the approval of the peloton. On Michaelskreuzstrasse the group thinned out considerably and Lemmen showed his best side.

Together with Grégoire, Vauquelin and Julian Alaphilippe, Lemmen was among the strongest riders in the race. Grégoire rode away from his breakaway companions on the descent and then soloed to the day's victory. In the sprint for second place Lemmen lost to Vauquelin, but stayed ahead of Alaphilippe. It was Lemmen's first podium finish in a WorldTour race.

"It was a beautiful day," Lemmen says. "Because of the many climbs at the beginning, it was a very open race situation. Tijmen did super well by jumping to the front right away. Then a big group got away, including Ben O'Connor. I thought: I have to be in it, because if his teammates are there, they will ride. I jumped after it and we all rode away pretty fast."

For Lemmen, it was pretty clear that the group would battle for the day's victory. "I tried to save my legs until the last climb. I knew the race would explode there," said Lemmen, who had excellent legs two weeks after the successful Giro d'Italia. "It could go two ways. I didn't train as much in recent weeks as I did in the period before the Giro, so I didn't really know what to expect. Fortunately, it fell in the right direction. I'm very happy with that."

In the standings, Lemmen is in third place and has no intention of giving that position away. "There are a lot of guys who can ride well uphill, but were not in the leading group today. In that sense, it is very favorable that we have already taken three minutes. It would be very nice to defend this third place, but we will see day by day how it goes. I can't deny that this is a good start."