Sam Welsford (Bora-Hansgrohe) won the opening stage of the Tour de Hongrie, outpacing Samuel Quaranta (MBH Bank Colpack Ballan) and Jakub Mareczko (Corratec-Vini Fantini) in a crash-hit sprint finish in Hajdúszoboszló.
The Australian bounced back from the disappointment of missing selection for the Giro d’Italia to take his fourth win of the year after a trio of victories on home ground at the Tour Down Under.
Behind him, Quaranta, the 21-year-old son of 1990s pro racer Ivan, couldn’t quite draw up alongside and had to settle for a clear second place, while fellow Italian Mareczko rounded out the podium ahead of Nicklas Pedersen (TDT-Unibet).
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"Everyone was quite nervous about the wind in the first half of the stage. Ultimately the wind wasn't strong enough and so we've had quite a relaxed day until we hit the finishing circuit," Welsford said after his win.
"Hats off to the breakaway – they did a pretty good job staying away from the bunch. In the sprint, I had a good position, used other team's trains and had really good legs to take my first win here in Hungary."
Mark Cavendish took sixth place at the line after going a touch early following his Astana Qazaqstan team’s lead out, his best sprint result since winning stage 4 of the Tour Colombia back in February.
The sprint for the line was set up after lone breakaway survivor Martin Voltr (Pierre Baguette) was caught 13km from the line having gone solo at 38km from the end of the flat 166km opener.
He had been previously joined by Mikel Bizkarra (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Balazs Rózsa (Epronex-Hungary) and Viktor Filutás (Hungary) in the move but proved the strongest to last longer than his companions. He’d also pick up seven seconds of time bonuses along the way to launch himself up into second overall behind the first leader of the race, Welsford.
In the final run to the line, it was Astana who set up the most coherent lead-out train, with three riders bringing Cavendish to the sprint. However, the train peeled away a little too early to leave the Manxman sprinting with over 200 metres to go.
To his right, the likes of Welsford, Quaranta, Mareczko and Manuel Peñalver (Polti-Kometa) were all spread across the road and hitting the wind a little later, while over by the barriers a touch of wheels saw Campbell Stewart (Jayco-AlUla) rider hit the deck hard, sparking a multi-rider crash as the sprint unfolded ahead.
As Welsford powered to the front at the 50-metre mark, Cavendish sat back in the saddle, acknowledging the Australian’s winning burst to the line. In the final metres, Quaranta, Mareczko, Pedersen and Peñalver came through to round out the top five behind the winner.
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