Moschetti wins opening Challenge Mallorca race

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Matteo Moschetti (Trek-Segafredo) won the opening leg of the Challenge Mallorca, at the Trofeo Felanitx, Ses Salines, Campos Porreres for his first victory with the team.

The Italian outsprinted Pascal Ackermann (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Jon Aberasturi (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) to the line in Felanitx, while Nacer Bouhanni (Arkéa-Samsic) finished his first race with his new team in eighth place.

The win is the third of Moschetti's career and comes after a tough 2019 campaign which included abandoning the Giro d'Italia midway through. A late crash on stage 10 left him with a dislocated shoulder and leg injuries.

The race was always likely to end with a sprint with the loss of the finish at the Coll de San Salvador from last year's race, but a break still ventured out regardless.

Ricardo Verza (Kometa Xstra), Rémy Mertz (Lotto Soudal), Aaron Van Poucke (Sport Vlaanderen-Baloise) and Claudio Imhof (Switzerland) were the men to make it out front. 

Their advantage reached a maximum of five minutes on the rolling roads of Mallorca, as Arkéa-Samsic and Bora-Hansgrohe controlled the pace behind.

At around 50km from the line, Verza dropped back from the break, the 22-year-old getting to grips with the speeds of the pro peloton for the first time. Israel Start-Up Nation and Fundación-Orbea also committed to the pacemaking in the closing kilometres, dragging the break back steadily.

Imhof and Mertz were the last men standing out front, with the Belgian taking the combativity prize as a result of his efforts. They held out until the 3km mark, at which point the organised sprinters teams were in full flight.

In the dash for the line, it was Moschetti who prevailed over one of the big sprint names of 2019, with Ackermann having to settle for the runner's up spot on his first race day of 2020.