photo credits @ Trek-Segafredo
Fabian Cancellara commenced his first victory of the season today, after winning the third race in this year’s Challenge Mallorca series – the Trofeo Serra de Tramuntana.
Cancellara executed his winning move from within the day’s breakaway group during the final 15 kilometers, that saw the Swiss rider managed to hold off his rivals to clinch a solo victory.
Meanwhile, Team Sky’s Michal Kwiatkowski finished in second some 20 seconds further back, while the rising Belgian talent, Tiesj Benoot (Lotto Soudal), rounded out the podium in third.
Race Highlights
Cancellara managed to bridge his way to the sizable 23-man breakaway group, that succeeded in riding clear of the peloton at midpoint in today’s race.
Amongst the breakaway group, were riders such as Tour de San Luis winner, Dayer Quintana (Movistar), along with Tao Geoghegan Hart (Great Britain), Hugh Carthy (Caja Rural), Daniel Teklehaimanot (Dimension Data) and Benat Intxausti (Sky).
From there, the group went on to built up a maximum advantage of more than two minutes over the main field.
However, all gave way to Cancellara during the descent of the Puig Major, while the Trek Segafredo rider proceeded to build up a 50 second lead along the day’s final climb of the Coll d’en Bleda.
Back in the peloton Team Sky and Movistar continued the pursuit in earnest, but despite sweeping up the remnants of the breakaway, they were unable to peg back Cancellara during the final 10 kilometers.
“I had no expectation to be in the breakaway,” Cancellara said. “It was unclear if the break would make it. At the end, I was just trying to save as much energy as I could and followed the attacks from the group. In the last climb somehow I managed to survive, and then I felt some good feelings return.”
Top 15 Finishers
1 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Trek-Segafredo 3:41:48 2 Michal Kwiatkowski (Pol) Team Sky 0:00:17 3 Tiesj Benoot (Bel) Lotto Soudal 4 Gianluca Brambilla (Ita) Etixx-QuickStep 5 Alejandro Valverde (Spa) Movistar Team 6 Merhawi Kudus (Eri) Dimension Data 7 Maxime Bouet (Fra) Etixx-QuickStep 8 Serge Pauwels (Bel) Dimension Data 9 Paul Voss (Ger) Bora-Argon 18 10 Tim Wellens (Bel) Lotto Soudal 11 Kanstantin Siutsou (Blr) Dimension Data 0:00:20 12 Luis Angel Mate (Spa) Cofidis 13 Lars Petter Nordhaug (Nor) Team Sky 14 Hugh Carthy (GBr) Caja Rural-Seguros RGA 15 Leopold Konig (Cze) Team Sky
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