"I will be able to start a bit later in the day": Remco Evenepoel gains crucial advantage ahead of a rainy timetrial

Despite the opening stage of Volta a Comunitat Valenciana being predicted as a relatively straightforward sprinter day, the opposite was true. Movistar and Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe found an unlikely alliance that attacked the head of the race on the day's only classified climb, the Puerto Los Madroños. Thanks to this effort, Joao Almeida was briefly put in danger of losing his GC bid, while Remco Evenepoel grabbed a free second on intermediate sprint, and his teammate Giulio Pellizzari nearly upset the remaining sprinters with a late attack. Ultimately though, everything came down to a regular sprint with Biniam Girmay on top.

"Movistar went fast on the climb, and then I saw that only a small group remained. We took control on the descent and tried to gain a bonus second, and we succeeded," Evenepoel told Sporza about the frontal attack.

Despite gaining a slight edge on his GC rivals, Evenepoel downplayed its significance for the final outcome of the race. "That’s not so important. The overall standings won’t come down to a second."

With relatively mild profiles at hand, the battle for overall victory should come down tomorrow's stage 2 time trial. On a 17-kilometer course, the Olympic, world, and European champion Remco Evenepoel is a clear favourite and his usual performance should be enough to seal the general classification with only stage 4 seemingly a threat to the final standings.

However there is at least one advantage to that extra second. Thanks to it, Evenepoel sits 7th overall, and thus will be among the last riders to set off for the time trial. That can bring him the advantage of knowing both the results of his rivals and how to ideally approach the race.

"It’s more about being able to start a bit later in the day," Evenepoel said of his bonus second. "They’re predicting rain in the morning, so the course will be dry by the time I start. That second was there, so why not?"

"We already reconnoitred the time trial during my mini training camp, but we’ll need to do that again tomorrow morning," said Evenepoel, who warmed down aboard his time trial bike after today's stage.

Unlike Evenepoel who took a relatively minimalistic approach to the stage, his younger teammate Giulio Pellizzari got a green flag for a long-range attack after the groups of Evenepoel and Almeida had come together. And it wasn't by any means a bad attempt as Pellizzari held out until the final two kilometers.

"We took the climb full gas,” Pellizzari told CyclingProNet. "We went for the bonus, to take some seconds for Remco. He took one second, so we can be happy, and then we just started with some attacks. I was lucky that I went, but the last kilometre was the hardest."

"I was a bit full gas, so I expected [to be caught] before the finish, but I just pulled until the end," said Pellizzari. "It was the first race for me, so I can only be happy with this."