UAE Team Emirates' Marc Hirschi returned to racing in Italy with a brilliant win at the Giro Della Toscana. Showing great tactical nous, the Swiss rider outfoxed his breakaway companions, edging out the likes of Lorenzo Rota of Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert and INEOS Grenadiers' Dani Martinez in a sprint finish.
As the race went over the last, decisive climb of the day, Hirschi was part of a 4 man group that broke off the front intent on chasing down sole leader Dani Martinez. Hirschi, Rota, Einer Rubio (Movistar Team) and Esteban Chaves (EF Education-EasyPost) cooperated well, with each rider rolling through and doing their turns on the front, never allowing Martinez to get a potentially race winning time gap.
As Martinez began to tie up, seemingly suffering from cramp, the now 5 man group began to play cat and mouse as they reached the finale. With the chasing pack far behind, the front of the race slowed and the tactical battle started.
Lorenzo Rota was the first to unleash his sprint, however he wasn't on the front for long as Hirschi flew past the Italian and rode to victory in the Tuscan heat.
Hirschi was delighted with his victory saying "It was a beautiful race and the perfect way to comeback to racing. In the climb I suffered a lot and couldn’t follow Martinez but we knew that in the last 20km we could work together and claw him back so we did that."
On the sprint finish he had this to say, "I had good legs for the sprint and knew I could be the fastest so to cross the line first was a huge satisfaction."
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