With 189,3 km, the third stage on Thursday between Mondorf-les-Bains and Mamer was the longest of the 81st edition of the SkodaTour Luxembourg.

Six riders broke away from the peloton: The Luxembourger Alex Kirsch (Trek) was accompanied by Ben O’Connor (Ag2r), Kenneth van Rooy (Sport Vlaanderen), Philipp Walsleben (Alpecin), Ceriel Desal (Bingoal) and Jasper de Buyst (Lotto-Soudal). Desal, however, was dropped with 55 km to go.

In the end, even the five remaining riders from the breakaway didn’t have a chance against the peloton and finally, the bunch sprint was won by Sacha Modolo (Alpecin) ahead of Benoit Cosnefroy (Ag2r) and Eduard-Michel Grosu (Delko).

However, one big name was absent from this sprint: After having finished the first two stages in the last position with a big gap, the Australian Caleb Ewan (Lotto-Soudal) didn’t start the third stage.

In the general classification, there were no changes in the first positions. Marc Hirschi (UAE Emirates) defended the yellow jersey with a lead of 4″ on Joao Almeida (Deceuninck) and 19″ on David Gaudu (Groupama).