Marit Raaijmakers won the 2026 Lotto Thüringen Women Cycling Challenge in Gera, sprinting to victory from a four-rider front group after a strange and selective day in Germany. The Human Powered Health rider beat teammate Iurani Blanco into second, with Malou Eisen taking third for VolkerWessels and Kristýna Zemanová finishing fourth for VIF Cycling Team.
The race, also known as Rund um Gera, replaced the long-running Thüringen Ladies Tour as a one-day event after the stage race struggled with funding. It still brought a strong field to Thuringia, with 82 riders from 15 nations taking part, and the route delivered enough climbing and late circuit pressure to split the race before the final sprint.
Human Powered Health made the most of having two riders in the winning move. Blanco opened the sprint for Raaijmakers and still held on for second, giving the WorldTour team a perfect finish from the decisive group. Behind, the chasing group came in 30 seconds down, with Canyon SRAM having to settle for sixth and seventh through Maike van der Duin and Chiara Consonni.
Strange start delays the race
The race began in unusual fashion. A fault with the race radio delayed the proper start by around 40 minutes, with the peloton forced to ride behind the red flag and even stop several times before the issue was resolved. Some riders used the delay to head to a nearby petrol station, an early sign that this would not be a straightforward day.
Once the technical problem had been fixed and the race was finally released, the attacking started almost immediately. The first attempt did not stick, and the field remained together in the opening kilometres.
The riders were then stopped again, this time by a closed railway barrier. That meant another enforced halt in warm and humid conditions, with temperatures close to 30 degrees. It was a frustrating start, especially with a climb waiting almost immediately after the crossing.
The repeated interruptions took some rhythm out of the early race, but they did not remove the difficulty of the route. Once the bunch was moving properly, the short climbs around Gera began to wear riders down.
Lumpy route replaces stage-race tradition
The 2026 Lotto Thüringen Women Cycling Challenge covered 121 kilometres around Gera, with a lumpy opening half followed by six laps of a finishing circuit. The Ferberturm climb, 1.6 kilometres at 6.2 per cent, gave the late laps a punchy edge and made it difficult for the peloton to keep control all the way to the finish.
There was also the Dörtendorf climb early in the race, but despite repeated attacks, no break was able to establish itself during the first part of the day. The field reached the finishing circuit largely together, with the stronger teams still waiting for the repeated laps to do their damage.
The event’s ProSeries status and its place as the successor to the Thüringen Ladies Tour gave it a useful level of depth. Human Powered Health and Canyon SRAM were the WorldTour presences, while VolkerWessels, VIF Cycling Team and several development and continental squads also had riders capable of shaping the race.
Corinna Lechner was one of the riders to make an impact on home roads. The Thüringen rider collected 8 of the available 12 mountain points and won the climbing classification, giving the local crowd a result to cheer even before the final sprint.
Rijnbeek goes long before the finale
The first move to gain real space came from Maud Rijnbeek of VolkerWessels. With around 40 kilometres remaining, she attacked and built a solo lead while the chasing group behind struggled to organise.
Rijnbeek’s advantage grew to almost a minute at one point, helped by hesitation among the riders behind. She rode strongly alone at the front and briefly looked as though she might force the race into a more open tactical phase before the final circuits.
The chase eventually became more committed. As the repeated climbs and warm conditions continued to bite, the front of the race began to reduce, and Rijnbeek’s gap started to fall. She was caught with around 24 kilometres remaining, bringing the main contenders back together before the decisive late attacks.
Her move still mattered. It forced teams to spend energy and set up the sharper racing that followed, especially once the finishing circuit began to break the race into smaller groups.
Late attacks split the bunch
The final phase saw the race become more aggressive. Lisa Klein was among the riders to try a move, but her attack was brought back after a few kilometres. The German rider would not be able to contest the win, but her move showed that the race had entered its decisive window.
With around 15 kilometres remaining, five riders went clear from the peloton. That selection contained the eventual winning group, although Klein later dropped out of it with around 7 kilometres to go. From there, four riders remained in front: Raaijmakers, Blanco, Eisen and Zemanová.
That was the critical split. The chasing group could not close the gap, and the leading quartet carried a useful advantage into the final kilometres. Human Powered Health had the obvious tactical advantage with two riders in the group, while Eisen and Zemanová had to manage both the sprint and the numerical imbalance.
Behind, Canyon SRAM missed the move and could not bring the race back. Van der Duin and Consonni eventually finished sixth and seventh, a reasonable result on paper but not enough from a race where the decisive move had gone without them.
Human Powered Health control the sprint
The final kilometres through Gera became a tactical contest between the four leaders. Raaijmakers and Blanco had the clearest advantage, with Blanco able to open the sprint and set up her teammate rather than wait passively for the others to move.
That proved decisive. Blanco launched the sprint for Raaijmakers and still had enough left to hold second place herself. Raaijmakers then came through to take the win, giving Human Powered Health the one-two and completing a strong team performance.
Eisen finished third, making the podium for VolkerWessels after a race in which her team had already animated the finale through Rijnbeek’s earlier solo move. Zemanová missed the podium but was part of the decisive selection, which still made it a strong ride for VIF Cycling Team.
The chasing group finished around 30 seconds down, confirming that the late split had been strong enough to decide the race rather than simply set up a reduced bunch sprint.
Raaijmakers takes the first Gera victory
For Raaijmakers, this was the first win of the new one-day version of the Thüringen race. That matters because the event carries the weight of the old Thüringen Ladies Tour, a race with a long history in women’s cycling before its recent funding difficulties forced the switch to a single-day format.
Winning the first Lotto Thüringen Women Cycling Challenge gives Raaijmakers a place in the event’s new chapter. It also continues a useful season for Human Powered Health, who converted their WorldTour strength into a clear result on a punchy course where control was never guaranteed.
The victory was built on numbers as much as speed. Raaijmakers was fast enough to win the sprint, but Blanco’s role in the final made the result much harder for Eisen and Zemanová to disrupt. Once the four riders were clear and Human Powered Health had half the group, the race was tilted in their favour.
It had taken a delayed start, a radio problem, a closed railway barrier, a long solo move and a late split to get there, but the finish itself was clean. Raaijmakers had the strongest team situation and the sprint to match.
Lotto Thüringen Women Cycling Challenge 2026 result
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