Sagan wins opening stage of BinckBank Tour by a hair

Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) claimed victory by the tightest of margins on stage 1 of the BinckBank Tour, edging out Phil Bauhaus (Sunweb) by millimetres in a bunch sprint in the Dutch town of Venray. 

After lunging for the finish at precisely the same time and crossing the line side by side, neither Sagan nor Bauhaus dared to raise an arm in celebration, and a photo finish was required to separate them. They endured a short but anxious wait as the judges deliberated over the image.

Last month, of course, the commissaires doled out a contentious verdict when they expelled Sagan home from the Tour de France following his clash with Mark Cavendish in the finishing straight in Vittel. On this occasion, there was rather prompter and far happier news for the world champion, who clenched his fist on receiving confirmation that he had clocked up the 98th victory of his career.

Sagan and Bauhaus were the class of the field in a chaotic sprint finish where a number of fancied names – most notably pre-stage favourite Marcel Kittel (Quick-Step Floors) – were unable to make any impact whatsoever.

Kittel was already out of contention – boxed in and too far back – by the time the peloton reached the first of two late roundabouts with a shade over a kilometre to go. At that point, André Greipel's Lotto Soudal team held the reins at the front, but their train seemed to lose a couple of carriages when the peloton separated around the next roundabout, and the German had to settle for ninth on the stage.

Sagan timed his effort well in the ensuing sprint, but faced a stiff challenge from the fast-finishing Bauhaus, who was closing in on the Slovak as they bore down on the finishing line. Sagan held on to win by a whisker, while Magnus Cort (Orica-Scott) claimed a distant third ahead of Dylan Groenewegen (LottoNL-Jumbo) and Boy van Poppel (Trek-Segafredo).

Unable to celebrate as he crossed the line, Sagan made amends by performing a wheelie for the gathered masses as he pedalled back towards the podium, where he received the first leader's jersey of the freshly-rebranded BinckBank Tour, previously known as the Eneco Tour.

Thanks to his winner's time bonus, Sagan will carry a lead of one second over Laurens De Vreese (Astana) and four seconds over Bauhaus into Tuesday's second stage, a nine-kilometre individual time trial in Voorburg.

How it unfolded

The BinckBank Tour's opening act, a pan-flat 170-kilometre run across the southern Netherlands, was always liable to end in a bunch finish, but that inevitable conclusion did not deter a quartet of willing attackers from forging clear shortly after the race was flagged away from the start in Breda.

De Vreese was joined on the offensive by Piet Allegaert (Sport Vlaanderen-Baloise), Mark McNally (Wanty-Groupe Gobert) and Elmar Reinders (Roompot-Nederlandse Loterij), but despite their smooth collaboration, the sprinters' teams were reluctant to grant them too much leeway and their early advantage was soon pegged back to more manageable two-minute buffer.

LottoNL-Jumbo, Quick-Step Floors and Bora-Hansgrohe were particularly prominent in keeping tabs on the four escapees, and come the final 50 kilometres, the gap stood at just 1:30. The sprinters' teams followed at that remove for the bulk of the final hour of racing, allowing De Vreese to claim nine bonus seconds thanks his efforts in the so-called Golden Kilometre – the trio of bonus sprints in the space of 1,000 metres, which on Monday arrived with 24 kilometres go.

Quick-Step et al began to wind up the pace in earnest on the finishing circuit around Venray, and with 10 kilometres to go, De Vreese, McNally, Allegaert and Reinders had just 20 seconds in hand on the bunch. They were swept up shortly afterwards, and the speed in the finale was such that no further escapes were able to gain a foothold.

Quick-Step's efforts and Kittel's Tour de France form meant that the German was an obvious favourite for stage honours, but he was poorly-positioned in the finale, while Arnaud Démare (FDJ) also failed to make an impression.

Sagan, however, was present and correct in the finale, and had just enough in reserve to see off the stiff challenge of Bauhaus. After an aggressive week at the Tour de Pologne that netted him a stage win, Sagan's build-up towards the defence of his world title in Bergen continues apace.

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