Sagan triumphs in stage one at Three Days of De Panne

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Peter Sagan of Liquigas-Cannondale continued his consistent start to the 2012 season by eking out the win in the opening stage at Three Days of De Panne. The young Slovakian champion narrowly outsprinted Astana's Jacopo Guarnieri and Liquigas-Cannondale teammate Fabio Sabatini to take the win and the lead in the race.

Guarnieri had opened the sprint and looked to have taken it, as the three opened up a small gap on the field in the last few hundred meters, but Sagan slipped around on his right side and won the stage by a matter of centimeters.

The beautiful Belgian spring weather continued for the first of the three days. In fact, the field was inspired enough to cover 49.6km in the first hour.

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The peloton stayed together on the opening run-in from Middelkerke to Oudenaarde, with the first serious attack coming shortly before hitting Oudenaarde. Ten riders tried to get away but never had more than 22 seconds before GreenEdge hauled them back.

From there, the peloton took on two laps of a 57.5km circuit with a total of 12 climbs. Almost immediately after hitting the finish line for the first time, Tosh Van Der Sande (Lotto-Belisol), Steven Van Vooren (Topsport Vlaanderen) and Reinier Honig (Landbouwkrediet) attacked, soon to be joined by Ronan Van Zandbeek (Project 1t4i) and William Clarke (Champion System).

The break built up a maximum lead of 2:10 but lost one of their members as Clarke struggled on the climbs and was eventually dropped. Many riders tried to bridge up, but the peloton wouldn't let anyone get away until Andy Cappelle (Accent.Jobs-Willems Veranda's) managed to break away alone and move up to the leaders.

From there it was open season as rider after rider joined them until a ten-man group formed. But it was all for naught, as the field refused to let them go.

Daniel Oss (Liquigas-Cannondale) jumped again, with Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) attempting to follow as the peloton began to be pulled apart by the high pace. Ben Hermans (RadioShack-Nissan) and GreenEdge's Sebastian Langeveld gave chase, and they were joined by Lieuwe Westra (Vacansoleil-DCM) and Guarnieri.

The five gradually built up a lead which never topped 30 seconds. They fought valiantly but were caught again with 10km to go.

That was the cue for Astana's Dmitriy Muravyev to take off, grinding out a lead on the final climb, the Kortekeer. The field gave furious chase, gathering him in again with 4km left. Liquigas-Cannondale then took command of things, to set up Sagan for the win.

Guarnieri opened the sprint, but Sagan and Sabatini went with him, opening a small gap on the field. Sagan moved around Guarnieri at the very final second to take the win, his third of the season.