Michael Albasini (Orica-Scott) edged out the competition to win the first stage of the Tour of Romandie.
The Swiss rider finished the stage from Aigle to Champéry ahead of Diego Ulissi (UAE Team Emirates) in second and Jesus Herrada (Movistar) in third.
The local Swiss rider was able to stay with the fast tempo set over the final first category climb and positioned himself well to launch towards his second victory of the season and seventh stage victory in the Swiss tour.
“It is a great victory today,” 36-year-old Albasini said. “It was not easy to win today coming straight from the classics as that was a big goal and it takes a lot of mental energy.”
“I really needed to focus coming to this race to suffer and to fight. It is Romandie so it is important I can come here and race well, so I am very happy that I could take the win today.
“I wasn’t so confident for today’s stage but I told myself if I can be there at the end in Liege-Bastogne-Liege after 4,000metres of climbing then why can’t I be able to be here over the climbs today.
“I tried to fight and stay in the bunch and it worked out to be even better than I thought so I am really happy with that.”
#TDR2017 Michael Albasini (ORS) gana la 1ª etapa en Champery por delante de Ulissi y @jesushl90. El conquense, 3º tras un sinuoso sprint. pic.twitter.com/xeWtnLuct6
— Movistar Team (@Movistar_Team) 26 aprilie 2017
Tour de Romandie 2017 – stage 1 results (Aigle – Champéry):
| 1 | Michael Albasini (Orica-Scott) | 4:33:10 |
| 2 | Diego Ulissi (UAE Team Emirates) | ,, |
| 3 | Jesus Herrada (Movistar) | ,, |
| 4 | Natnael Berhane (Dimension Data) | ,, |
| 5 | Chris Froome (Team Sky) | ,, |
| 6 | Pello Bilbao (Astana) | ,, |
| 7 | Wilco Kelderman (Team Sunweb) | ,, |
| 8 | David De La Cruz (Quick-Step Floors) | ,, |
| 9 | Richard Carapaz (Movistar) | ,, |
| 10 | Pierre Roger Latour (AG2R) | ,, |
General classification after stage 1:
| 1 | Fabio Felline (Trek-Segafredo) | 4:39:07 |
| 2 | Maximilian Schachmann (Quick-Step Floors) | +08” |
| 3 | Jesus Herrada (Movistar) | ,, |
| 4 | Primoz Roglic (LottoNl-Jumbo) | +09” |
| 5 | Ion Izagirre (Bahrain Merida) | +12” |
| 6 | Bob Jungels (Quick-Step Floors) | ,, |
| 7 | Jose Goncalves (Katusha-Alpecin) | +13” |
| 8 | Ruben Fernandez (Movistar) | ,, |
| 9 | Michael Albasini (Orica-Scott) | +14” |
| 10 | Jonathan Castroviejo (Movistar) | ,, |
