The opening day of the Tour of Guangxi featured a four-man breakaway from the start.
On the stage’s sole classified climb, Rémi Cavagna (Quick-Step Floors) was joined from the peloton by Jonathan Lastras (Caja Rural) and the duo managed to keep the chasers at bay until the three kilometers to go mark, where they were reabsorbed by the pack.
Brimming with confidence after a solid final part of the season, Gaviria left it late and kicked out with only 100 meters to go, sailing from the right side of the road past Dylan Groenewegen (LottoNL-Jumbo) and Pascal Ackermann (Bora-Hansgrohe) en route to claiming his first ever victory in Asia, and with it, the leader’s jersey in the Tour of Guangxi.
“We had only 100 kilometers on the menu today, but it was a very difficult stage, because of the wind and the speed in the bunch. The break wasn’t large and luckily we had Rémi there, who proved just how strong he was, getting caught only in the final kilometers”, said Gaviria.
“My teammates did again a great job and I’m glad I could repay them with this victory. It’s always nice to win a race, especially a World Tour one, and I’m happy to have added another win to the team’s remarkable haul of successes this season.”
Tour of Guangxi 2017 – stage 1 results (Beihai – Beihai):
| 1 | Fernando Gaviria (Quick-Step Floors) | 2:20:01 |
| 2 | Dylan Groenewegen (LottoNl – Jumbo) | ,, |
| 3 | Pascal Ackermann (Bora – hansgrohe) | ,, |
| 4 | Maximilian Walscheid (Team Sunweb) | ,, |
| 5 | Wouter Wippert (Cannondale – Drapac) | ,, |
| 6 | Andrea Guardini (UAE Team Emirates) | ,, |
| 7 | Danny Van Poppel (Team Sky) | ,, |
| 8 | Dylan Page (Caja Rural – Seguros RGA) | ,, |
| 9 | Rick Zabel (Katusha – Alpecin) | ,, |
| 10 | Moreno Hofland (Lotto – Soudal) | ,, |
