Sean Quinn (EF Education-EasyPost) secured his first pro win on the second stage at Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali after joining a late-race breakaway and winning the four-way uphill sprint to the line on the steep Muro del Belvedere.
Gianluca Brambilla (Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team), who instigated a last attack on the breakaway with 3km to go, was caught by the four top finishers in the closing metres of the race and finished in fifth at three seconds back.
A reduced peloton split apart on the final ascent, with the main group of riders finishing 56 seconds behind the stage winner.
“It's quite a relief to get this first win, to be honest. I’ve missed out on a few opportunities in the past, so it feels great to finally get that win," Quinn said.
“Winning is nothing without the people around you. I just want to say a huge thank you to the team, the staff, my teammates and everyone who has supported me throughout the low points over the last couple of years.”
Schmid, who also finished second on the previous day's stage into Riccione, moved into the overall lead as the race heads into stage 3's hilly circuit race in Forlì.
The second stage at Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali presented a 172.5km race from Riccione to Longiano that included four 22.8km circuits with ascents Roncofreddo (6.8km at 3.6%) and Bivio Monteleone, and a finishing climb atop Muro del Belvedere (900m at 10.5%) in Longiano.
An early breakaway emerged in the opening 20km of the stage with Florian Lipowitz (Bora-Hansgrohe), Veljko Stojnić (Team Corratec), James Fouché (Bolton Equities Black Spoke), Marco Murgano (Team Corratec) and Emanuele Ansaloni (Team Technipes #inEmiliaRomagna).
They quickly pushed their lead out to more than three minutes with 148km to go and then again to more than five minutes mid-race.
Soudal-QuickStep kept the gap manageable before rapidly closing it on the final two circuits.
As riders dropped from the breakaway, Lipowitz continued alone before being joined by late-race attackers, who bridged across from the reduced peloton, James Shaw and Sean Quinn (EF Education-EasyPost), Thomas Gloag (Jumbo-Visma), Mauro Schmid (Soudal-QuickStep), Gianluca Brambilla and Walter Calzoni (Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team).
The reshuffled breakaway held a slim 16 seconds over the bunch with 10km from the finish line but extended their lead to 43 seconds with 5km to go.
Lipowitz was distanced from the breakaway after Brambilla attacked at 3km out and as the pace increased in the chase behind. Schmid, Quinn, Shaw and Calzoni joined Brambilla inside the final kilometre, but Brambilla lost contact on the climb into Longiano, leading to a four-way sprint for the stage win.
“When the two guys attacked on the final climb and got a little bit of a gap on James and I knew we could come back in the last few hundred meters,” said Quinn. “I've been in situations like that before, where you just go overboard too early. And maybe I could have followed him at first. But I trusted that I had the legs and that I could come back a bit later. But it was hard. I had to suffer a bit.”
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