Van Avermaet victorious in Paris-Tours

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Greg Van Avermaet (BMC Racing Team) outsprinted breakaway companion Marco Marcato (Vacansoleil-DCM) to win Paris-Tours on Sunday. Kasper Klostergaard of Saxo Bank-Sungard took third, as the expected mass sprint didn't materialise.

"I'm really good at sprinting after a long hard race and so is he ...but in the end I was stronger," Van Avermaet said. "I was happy he was working very well in the end. We decided to go full out to the finish and then see who was the fastest in the sprint.

"The team did a really good job and we tried to make the whole race really hard and control the race the whole day."

188 riders set out into the wind and rain on the day, with less than half of them making it to the end.

A group of seven riders five riders got away early and built up a lead of just over 11 minutes. However, the lead of Will Clarke (Leopard Trek), David Boucher (Omega Pharma-Lotto), Sébastien Delfosse (Landbouwkrediet), Rubens Bertogliati (Team Type 1), Andreas Klier (Garmin Cervelo), Rony Martias (Saur Sojasun) and Jurgen Van Goolen (Veranda's Willems – Accent) came down under pressure from behind.

The sprinters' teams gave furious chase, with Rabobank for defending champion Oscar Freire and HTC-Highroad riding for World champion Mark Cavendish leading the way.However, none of the sprinters' teams was able to organise things enough to bring their speedy men up to the very front.

With about 70 km to go, the gap had shrunk enough that an additional 15 riders, including Van Avermaet, was able to bridge up to the group. The larger group's lead never reached the two minute mark, but it was enough.

Arnaud Gerard (FDJ) was the first to attack out of the breakaway, at about the 17km marker. Van Avermaet and Marcato gave chase, easily catching and dropping the Frenchman. Sylvain Chavanel and Philippe Gilbert tried desperately to bridge up from the peloton, but couldn't get away.

The two leaders took enough of a lead into the final kilometer to not worry about their chasers. Van Avermaet hung on to Marcato's rear wheel before taking off at the 300 meter mark to win.

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