Volta ao Algarve: Gaviria wins stage 1 in Lagos

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Fernando Gaviria (Quick-Step Floors) claimed his first European victory of the season, playing off a late attack by teammate Max Richeze to take out the stage and first leader's jersey of the Volta ao Algarve.

Katusha, Cofidis and Lotto Soudal battled for the lead in the final kilometers, but Quick-Step kept its powder dry, sitting back until they were inside the last 300m.

Richeze launched an early attack, burning up the Cofidis lead-out for Nacer Bouhanni. Bouhanni started his sprint early but faded to third, while Gaviria sat on Andre Greipel's wheel and when Gaviria surged with 150m to go the German could not quite get past.

"I am very happy, because I just came back from Colombia, where I worked really well, and this win shows this," Gaviria said. "It was a royal sprint, with some of the world’s fastest riders fighting for victory, and to beat them is really nice, especially as the wind was pretty strong out there. A big thanks to the team, because they were perfect and did a superb job today."

Gaviria also revealed that he had special motivation to win the stage: "Yesterday I made a bet with Davide Bramati, who promised that if I win a stage here, then I get green light to line up at the National Championships on February 26th. I'm delighted to have won this bet and get the ticket for Colombia. It would be a huge pride to wear this beautiful jersey at least once in my career and I hope it will happen this year."

How it happened

A five-man breakaway took off early in the stage, and included Christoph Pfingsten (Bora-Hansgrohe), Justin Oien (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Brian van Goethem (Roompot-Nederlandse Loterij), João Benta (RP-Boavista) and Adam de Vos (Rally Cycling).

They quickly built up a lead of over seven minutes, but after claiming first place on day's only climb, the category 3 Sitio da Picota, De Vos sat up and went back to the peloton, knowing that a sprint finish was inevitable, and he would wear the mountains jersey on stage 2.

The other four riders persisted, but were steadily reeled in by the sprinters' teams, with Lotto Soudal, Cofidis and Trek-Segafredo making a blockade of red at the front of the peloton.

The breakaway's chances were further dashed when Van Goethem suffered a mechanical, and with 30km still remaining, when Pfingsten led them across the line for the final intermediate sprint, they had little more than half a minute's advantage.

With 26km to go, the race was all back together, setting up a furious final 4km with lead-out trains battling for position.

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