ADAC Hamburg Cyclassics Preview - Battle of the fast men

Lost in the noise and hubbub of summer stage racing, the ADAC Hamburg Cyclassics is, perhaps the forgotten WorldTour one day race. It is, without doubt a sprinter’s classic, but this is not Classic Brugge-De Panne, here in northern Germany there’s plenty of climbing on the menu.

However, despite the lumpy parcours, the race is more often than no concludes in a bunch kick. First run in 1996, those early editions witnessed solo breaks or small groups, but in 1999 Mirko Celestino’s victory was the first from a bunch kick and almost every edition since has been won the same way, which is why this year’s race has attracted a stellar line up of some of the world’s best fast men.

Perhaps chief among those is Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) who heads to Germany for his first outing since winning the Points classification and two stages at the Tour de France. The three intervening weeks will certainly given him time to recover from the Tour, but has he had enough time to rebuild, we shall see.

After beating Milan into second place last year, illness has caused the withdrawal of Olav Kooij, though Visma | Lease a Bike team mate Wout van Aert is a more than able deputy. He too has not raced since taking that epic win in the Paris rain to close the Tour de France, Van Aert is one of those riders who seems to be in a permanent state of readiness, and though he’s never won in Hamburg, he has finished on the podium.

We didn’t see much of Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck) in the Tour de France sprints, his stage 20 win coming from a heroic, audacious solo move, but in the bunch finishes his best result was third on stage eight. However, the Australian is one of the most versatile sprinters in the peloton and will surely compete in the final. Another we didn’t see too much of at the Tour was Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty), the Eritrean has seemed out of sorts this year and is yet to take a win. In France he and faded out of the sprint top fives after finishing second on the opening day, eventually his defence of the green jersey he won in 2024 was little more than perfunctory.

Perhaps the man with the form is Paul Magnier. The Frenchman has been on the rise ever since bursting on the scene by winning his first race for Soudal-Quickstep at the start of 2024. Since then he has nine more wins, the most recent of those was stage four of the Tour of Poland, where not only did he out-power the rest of the peloton, but out thought them with the most beautifully timed kick.

With riders like Sam Bennett (Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale), Axel Laurance (Ineos Grenadiers), Marco Haller (Tudor), Jordi Meeus (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) and Pascal Ackermann (Israel-Premier Tech) all on the start line, many teams are fully invested in making the race another bunch sprint. 

With more than 1,700m of vertical ascent over the 207.4km, there is significantly more climbing than last year’s event, though the position of the climbs hasn’t changed, with the top of the final ascent of the signature Waseberg 16km from the line.

The race has a new start location too, rolling out from Buxtenhude, south-west of Hamburg itself. A long but shallow climb features early on and could be where the day’s breakaway its allowed clear.

Once in the city the route heads back and forth along the north shore of the Elbe river, heading west, turning round and tackling the Waseberg for the first time before crossing the line to finish the first of three large laps. The final two of those laps includes a smaller loop, also including the Waseberg, making for five ascents of the 700m climb which averages 9.1% gradient.

The climb attracts action and it’s the perfect launch pad for a heroic move, we could even see a replay of Van Aert’s victory in Paris, though probably without the rain. But if someone does get away so many teams are interested in a sprint finish it will ensure a fantastically tense final.

The 2025 ADAC Hamburg Cyclassics will be broadcasted on the usual broadcasting channels, those being Discovery, Max and Eurosport. Within the United Kingdom, the race is available to watch on TNT sports and will be available online on the Discovery+ player. In the United States and Canada, it will be available to watch on FloBikes.