Stage 3 of Tour of the Alps 2023 took the professional peloton on a 162.5-kilometer ride from Ritten in Southern Tyrol to Brentonico San Valentino on a challenging mountain route featuring the category 2 Lago di Cei climb and culminating with a category 1 climb to the finish line that featured sections of up to 16 percent. 

Ritten was once a popular summer vacation location for wealthy families, including Bozen and Bolzano, and a popular place for artists, writers and doctors, including novelist Franz Kafka and neurologist and psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud.

Ineos-Grenadiers’ Tao Geoghegan Hart led the general classification before today’s stage with an 18 second advantage over Felix Gall (AG2R-Citroen) and 22 seconds ahead of Hugh Carthy (EF Education-EasyPost).

Early action in stage 3 was dominated by a breakaway group featuring Jasha Sütterlin (Bahrain-Victorious), Juri Hollmann (Team Movistar), Andrea Vendrame (AG2R-Citroen), Lorenzo Milesi (Team DSM), Joe Dombrowski (Astana), Riccardo Lucca (Green Project-Bardiani CSF-Faizane), Txomin Juaristi (), Giovanni Carboni (Team Kern Pharma), Mattia Bais (Eolo-Kometa), Lukas Pöstlberger and Alexander Hajek (Team Jayco-Alula), and Liam Johnston (Trinity Racing).

On the descent from Lago di Cei Bahrain-Victorious’ Jasha Sütterlin attacked solo and built a small advantage, but he was caught by his fellow breakaway buddies when the riders reached the flat terrain of the valley. Meanwhile, EF Education-EasyPost was pulling at the front of the main peloton group in support of their leader Hugh Carthy.

26 kilometers from the finish, the breakaway group had a four minutes and twenty-eight seconds advantage over the main peloton, and it appeared a rider from an early breakaway would finally prove successful in a stage.

When the riders approached the final Brentonico San Valentino climb a duo featuring Vendrame and Pöstlberger had escaped from the breakaway group and established a small lead of 11 seconds, while the main peloton was chasing behind with a disadvantage of 03:15.

Vendrame went solo on the climb, while being chased by a duo featuring Dombrowski and Juaristi. Meanwhile, EF Education-EasyPost were setting a fast pace at the front of the main peloton group.

Ten kilometers from the finish line, Dombrowski had replaced Vendrame at the front, while the front man’s advantage over the main peloton had been reduced to approximately two minutes with Bora-Hansgrohe leading the chasers to improve the odds of a rider from the main group winning the stage.

Seven kilometers from the end of the stage, Dombrowski was the only man ahead of the main peloton and his lead had been reduced to a mere 55 seconds. Alas, it looked as if the winner of the stage would not be found amongst the riders that had animated the stage by taking part in the day’s long breakaway.

Bora-Hansgrohe’s Lennard Kämna then launched a solo attack from the peloton and quickly built a gap. Jefferson Alexander Cepeda attacked for EF Education-EasyPost and joined Kämna with 3.1 kilometers left of the battle. The duo then caught Dombrowski who found it too challenging to keep up with Cepeda and Kämna. Meanwhile, the main peloton had been reduced to about ten men further behind and Ineos-Grenadiers had taken to the front in support their race leader Geoghegan Hart. 

Geoghegan Hart attacked with 1.7 kilometers left in an attempt to catch the front duo, but at first he was unable to form a gap. 

Kämna attacked in the final five hundred meters after letting Cepeda do all the hard work in the front duo and won the stage after crossing the finish line solo, practically stealing the victory from Cepeda in unfair fashion. 

Kämna’s teammate Alexander Vlasov managed to pass Cepeda in the final meters to finish second, while Cepeda finished third and race leader Geoghegan Hart finished fourth.

In the general classification Geoghegan Hart remains Tour of the Alps 2023 leader. Hugh Carthy (EF Education Easypost) climbed to second place and is 22 seconds behind Hart. Bahrain-Victorious’ Jack Haig is third, 28 seconds behind the leader.