Welcome to Colorado for the USAPCC in Colorado. The weather is fine for the first stage of this race which is a flat stage. There are two hills inside the final 30 kms though but a flat run in should give us a sprint. The favourites are Farrar, Gatto and Brea.
No attacks yet as we approach the first intermediate sprint of the day so the sprinter will have a chance to take some points.
It's Brea who crosses first in front of Farrar and Gatto while no other riders seem to be intrested.
Zeits initiates the first attack. Borges jumps in his wheel. Vichot, Passeron, Reguigui and Gerrans are next to attack but are quickly chased back by Loosli.
The duo in front quickly establish a 3 minute gap and they will be our break of the day.
They don't sprint for the mountain points as Zeits leads over.
Grygorenko attacks from the peloton for third, he is followed by the Lukoil domestiques who are leading the peloton.
Borges takes the second intermediate sprint. Farrar wins the sprint between the sprinters.
Nothing intresting happens during this dull stage so we fast forward to the final. The leaders start the penultimate hill with a lead of around 2 minutes 30 on the peloton. Lukoil are still doing most of the work there.
Zeits takes full mountain points again. The duo is sharing the prices so far.
Serov leads over the peloton two minutes later. Damrow, Afewerki and Anaya are dropped together with Kurth who had a flat tire. The latter might have been usefull to Amex during the sprint preparations.
Borges leads over the last mountain sprint but Zeits seizes the mountains jersey. You can see the peloton where Lukoil is still working in the background, they are only a minute behind.
More riders are dropped from the peloton, stage favourite Brea is one of them. Cucinotta and Korzh are dropped aswell while Gatto, Borrajo and Keukeleire are sitting at the back of the peloton.
The break is caught during the descent and right after turning up the flat road, Zaini attacks. Morabito jumps in his wheel.
Unexpected twist as Continental leader Kritskiy jumps behind them. He has showed already that taking some extra seconds in flat stages can help him to bigger succes.
Kritskiy goes straight past Zaini and Morabito and has quite a nice gap over the peloton with 2.5 km to the line. Zaini and Morabito quickly fall back to the peloton.
It's quite a mess at the front of the peloton. The hills took more energy than expected so no team can seize control over the peloton.
It's Chavanel who starts the sprint behind with Bole and Machado in his wheel. Karpets is close to the front aswell but he is not really known to be fast or explosive.
Kritskiy powers on under the red kite. It seems like his lead has even increased.
And he holds on for victory! Gutsy attack that payed off because none of the sprinters was close to the front which caused some chaos. Kritskiy starts this race perfect.
Bibby wins the sprint for second with Kadri taking third.
The jury decides the gap for Kritskiy was not big enough to give him some advantage but he still has the 20 bonus seconds. Bibby also puts himself in a comfortable position early-on.
