HTC-Columbia’s Adam Hansen secured the first stage race win of his career when he finished safely in the main pack on Sunday’s final day of the Ster Elektrotoer in Holland. Hansen took the race lead after winning Saturday’s hilly stage before making a successful defense of his number one position overall on Sunday’s final 174-kilometre stage from Arcen to Helmond.

“Adam said he specifically wanted to ride this race rather than doing the Tour de Suisse, and he certainly made a good choice,” said HTC-Columbia’s sports director Tristan Hoffman. “After doing so well on Saturday’s stage, he became the team leader for the race, and he gave it everything he could to make sure he could win. The final stage was totally flat, and we managed to control the early breaks with help from the other sprinters’ teams and keep things together. But then Adam had a mechanical problem and the whole team waited for him and made sure he got back to the bunch. It was important to work for a bunch sprint for André [Greipel] , but we wanted to be sure Adam got his first stage race win, too.”

Hansen’s victory comes on a great day all around for HTC-Columbia, with Germany’s Tony Martin taking another win for the team in the Tour de Suisse’s final stage, a time trial in Liestal.