Farrar times it right, takes the prize in Schoten

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Garmin-Transition's sprinter Tyler Farrar timed his sprint to perfection to take home the big prize in the Scheldeprijs. The American topped Robbie McEwen (Katusha) and Robert Förster (Milram) after Belgian Tom Boonen led the sprint for Quick Step teammate Wouter Weylandt, who took fifth behind Sky's Greg Henderson.

It was the second win of the year for Farrar, who also took a stage of the Three Days of De Panne last week.

"I've won some big races but I've never had a win in the Classics' season so it's something special,” the 25-year-old winner said. “I know I had a good chance though and this was one of my objectives for the spring."

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Farrar gave credit to his argyle-clad teammates. “You see the work that everyone did today on my team, they were fantastic. It wasn't easy, they were a really strong breakaway so we had to ride hard with Columbia and we did everything to ensure it was a sprint.”

The race set out under sunny skies, but short one team. Cofidis had to cancel its appearance when it was unable to scrape together a team due to illnesses and injuries.

Things got off to a roaring start, as the field covered a whopping 50.3km in the first hour. That was when the day's group got away. Jonas Ljungblad (Omega Pharma-Lotto), Mathew Hayman (Sky), Jackson Stewart (BMC), David Boucher (Agricole), Arnoud Van Groen (Vacansoleil), Cyril Lemoine (Saur), Grégory Joseph (Topsport Vlaanderen) and Niko Eeckhout (An Post) took off and built up a lead of over six minutes.

The group worked well together, but the sprinters' teams were determined to have their say and started cutting the lead down. Team HTC-Columbia did much of the chasing work, and the gap dropped quickly.

With about 45km to go, the gap fell to 2:30 minutes, which seemed to make the peloton more comfortable.

Former World Champion Tom Boonen (Quick Step) crashed about 37 km before the finish line, and spent a long time at the team car before heading back to the peloton. There were a number of crashes and a lot of flat tyres throughout the day.

HTC-Columbia ground the lead down and at the 20km marker, it had shrunk to under a minute. The last of the escapees was caught with 10km to go, and the field stayed together until the end.

After having done so much work, HTC-Columbia disappeared in the finale. Sky moved to the front with 3km to go, but looked to have moved too early, with Henderson being along at the Flamme Rouge.

Boonen opened the sprint, and Farrar flew by him to claim the win.