Elia Viviani stuns to win opening Tour of Guangxi sprint, first World Tour win in over 4 years

Elia Viviani has not had an easy time in recent years but has taken a very important win today. For the first time since 2019 he's won a World Tour race, taking the first victory and leader's jersey at the Tour of Guangxi.

The opening day of racing saw a breakaway of four riders go up the road featuring Omer Goldstein (Israel - Premier Tech), Dries de Bondt (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Louis Barré (Arkéa Samsic) and Frederik Wandahl (BORA - hansgrohe).

The quartet became a trio with 44 kilometers to go but the pace was never overly serious. The peloton comfortably controlled the breakaway and reeled it in with 15 kilometers to go. At first, the folloing kilometers were actually calm, but the pace began to ramp up with 5 kilometers to go.

The leadouts were all fresh and this meant very high speeds all the way into the finish. This also meant leadouts were burned up early on, and chaos ensued in the final kilometer. There was no team well organized at the front.

Jonathan Milan launched his sprint early to avoid being swarmed, Elia Viviani saw himself in the perfect place as he was in the wheel of his compatriot, and he then sprinted for victory. He beat Milan and Sam Bennett who completed the podium.