It's a windy day at the off which will likely make this race on the harder side.
Within 15 kilometres from the off a three man break establishes itself.
Honkisz, Vaseline and Locatelli make this early dart. All three are decent punchy riders but certainly not seen as much of a threat their lead quickly balloons to over three minutes.
We hit our first section of Strade Bianchi with 140kms to go.
Vespa, Metinvest and Swedbank lead us through this first section with the gap to the three man break approaching three minutes.
It's a long 10km stretch of the white stuff, but coming this early on it was unlikely to have an effect. The wind is relatively calm as well, all that really happens is the break extend their lead to over six minutes.
We get one more short Bianchi section before the toughest climb of the day with 110km to go. Again all we get here is the break extending their lead to over seven minutes, the climb gets pretty steep neat the top - the trio stick together as the wind begins to howl.
Metinvest, Vespa and UPC are just beginning to notch the pace up here reducing the gap to the break slightly.
Our third section of Strade Bianchi comes with 90km to go, the breaks advantage is down to six minutes. This could be a dangerous section for the pack with the wind quite high, we can see things lined out.
It's a long 15km section and as the break come out of it their lead is down to 5 minutes with 75km left to go.
The pack are still together with just Criado dropped having fallen at the end of the white road section.
We reach the last 60km of this tricky race.
The breaks lead is down to four minutes with all the work being done by Vespa and Metinvest.
Our fourth Strade Bianchi section is reached with 50km left.
This section contains some difficult climbs on the white stuff so whilst the wind has eased a bit riders are under pressure.
Snap goes the elastic.
Just 50 or so riders remain in the front peloton. We scan through the riders dropped.
Richeze, Kunitski, Leverlet , Eefting, Krasnkv, Keisse, El fares, Vasylyuk, De Greek, Barrio, Niemec, Danielson, Avelino, Tereul, Galimzyanov, Gatto, Trusov.
Some decent sprinters, punchaers and roulers gone then with 56 the exact count of riders left in front group still led by Vespa and Metinvest.
35km to go then and the gap to the three men up front is two and half minutes. Zabalo goes on the attack from the peloton.
We have come off that long 15km white road section, interestingly Zabalo is strong enough to eek out a minute on the pack who are just cruising waiting for that final push.
25km to go:
The lead three
Have a minute on Zabalo.
Whom has 50 seconds on the 55 man pack, those behind that have scattered between two and five minutes down on the pack chances in this race surely over.
HtC and Swedbank now lead the pack.
20km to go and we plunge down into yet another Strade Bianchi section, our last I believe.
The gaps are down to 24 seconds and 49 seconds.
As Zabalo is caught we are getting more riders shed from the lead group.
Firstly we have Caldiara, Uuganbayer, Loosli - Cimalai and Moser.
Then a more major split.
18 more riders drop off including Korzh, Smukalis, Priamo, Golas, Rovny, Brambilla, Lorenzetto, Dall’Antonia, Iglinski, Armee, Capecchi, Metzec.
Dall Antonia makes a burst to pull these riders back.
He could be too late though as four riders have attacked at the front.
We have still to catch our break who have just over a minute, but these four - De Maar, Bellis, Elizen and Hermans are top quality roulers and will close that kind of gap quickly.
Onto our final Strade Bianchi stretch with 12 km to go and rather surprisingly Bellis drops off leaving just Elijzen, Hermans and De Maar ahead.
Bellis however is bluffing and as they catch the break he stuns the other three by attacking last under the 10km to go.
De Maar gets stuck as his HTC team pull what's left of the pack up to the break away.
Things settle for a moment and we can see three riders with a minutes gap.
Bellis, Hermans and Elijzen seem to have pulled off the move of the race.
The pack is sitting up seemingly resigned to their fate.
6km to go and Elijzen and Hermans realise they have to attack Bellis and do just that.
Meanwhole two minutes back De Maar looks to attack the pack for the 4th place.
Bellis reels in the attack, saying is that all you’ve got. Elijzen responds in kind.
Bellis again though is equal to this.
Just two kilometres left and this last steady uphill to the finish. These three have 1.20 on De Maar and 1.50 on the pack.
Bellis launches his sprint with 1500m left with Hermans right on his wheel, Elizjen looks beaten.
800m.
Hermans struggles to hold the Brit.
500m
A gap opens.
200m
Bellis has this with Hermans second Elizjen third and De Maar 4th.
De Maar got caught at an unfortunate time but does make the fourth spot ahead of a sprinting pack.
Hoffman beats Roelandts, Haussler, Guernieri, Wegmann, Ventoso and Van der Lijke in the sprint for the minor places.
