Development Team Sunweb put in a huge ride to protect Marc Hirschi (SWI) on the concluding stage of Tour de l'Ain today, with the 19 year old going on to take 8th on the stage, finish 4th overall and secure the young riders jersey.

After the win Hirschi said: "Tour de l'Ain has been a really good race for us. It's such a hard race and the guys protected me well and put me in a good position to be able to follow the GC guys on the important moments each day. I was with the GC guys today until 2.5 kilometres to go where I had to let the group go. From there I just paced my way up the climb and managed not to lose too much time from the first riders. I'm really happy with the white jersey and the 4th place in the GC against a field like this. Overall it's been a really good race and we can be happy with the result."

Team Sunweb coach Koen de Haan (NED) added: "After a strong first two days of racing from the team, today was about keeping things in tact, protecting Marc's position in the GC and defending his young rider jersey. He put all he had into getting the best position possible and the team did a good in supporting him. It's a really strong performance from a 19 year old rider in a hard race like this, especially with the young team supporting him. This is a great race for them to develop and experience racing at this level against WorldTour teams and the team have shown some really good things here."