Welcome to the Colombo Classic! It's a nice sunny day with pretty much zero wind. Perfect conditions for the riders to perform in, as they tackle the Colombo circuit 8 times. Before a final uphill and descent to the finish line. A lot of people have gathered at the start to see the riders. The green light is on and the race begins!
The riders have barely left the city limits of Colombo and we get our first attacks. Mugisha starts things off, followed by Gregaard and Lonardi.
A few kilometres later the next attack that's able to spring free is from Schinnagel, Munton and Lopez. So Bralirwa is able to put two men in the breakaway.
A few other individual attacks occured as well, but the peloton were not willing to let more men up the road. With mainly Phillips and Centovalli patrolling at the head of the peloton. A good 20 km's into the race the two groups of escapees merged together to form the break of the day. With a gap of 2'30'' the breakaway now consists of the following riders:
Mugisha Lopez Gregaard Lonardi Schinnagel Munton
As the peloton hit the bigger climb of the circuit for the 2nd time, their deficit to the breakaway has grown to almost 4 minutes. Centovalli, BNZ, Eddie Stobart and Philips are the teams working at the front.
We are now on the climb for 4th time with 4 more to go on this circuit for the breakaway. They are working well together and their gap is still a sizeable 3'42'' with 109 km from the finish.
The peloton have now crested the climb for the 6th time now. The gap is at 2'53'' with 65 km to go. Gjensidige have joined the before mentioned teams in chasing the breakaway.
The escapees have finished the climb for the 7th time and are now on the descent. The gap is at 2'18'' with 43 km to go. The peloton is still all in one piece with 132 riders together.
The peloton is now tackling this climb for the final time and the gap is still at 1'46''. Have they taken it too easy? Well it's hard enough for some as the peloton has basically split in half. Most of the favourites are in the first group. The only notable absentees are Ben Nasser and Smirnovs.
This is it, the circuit is now finished and the breakaway is about to enter final climb. It's a difficult climb especially in the first kilometer, it then levels off before the downhill to the finish line. The situation on the road is as follows. The breakaway is still 6 man strong and 42'' advantage over the peloton. The favourites still have plenty of helpers with them, but there are less than 10 km left and a large portion of that is downhill. Can they make a last minute catch?
It looks so close, but the transponders still say it's a 30'' gap between the breakaway and the peloton, just as they deal with the steepest part of the climb. Lindau, Schelling, Bovenhuis and Thiery are still chasing.
They're over the top and the gap has actually grown out to 37''! Gregaard did a massive turn at the front for the breakaway, while Lopez has just lost contact and is now in between the groups. 6.3 km left for the leaders, it's mostly downhill from here.
The peloton are still chasing hard and it's 3 km from the finish now, the gap is at 28''. It looks like the breakaway have an excellent chance to make it all the way!
The down hill is done and we are under the flamme rouge. The gap has not changed, it's gonna be a sprint finish between the escapees. This how they are positioned (back to front).
Mugisha Lonardi Schinnagel Munton Gregaard
Less than 200 m to go. Schinnagel is in Gregaard slipstream, while Mugisha seems too far back.
Mugisha
Lonardi
Schinnagel
Munton
Gregaard
Gregaard takes the win in the sprint! Well deserved for him from the perspective of the work he put on that final climb, where his climbing ability really came to the fore. Lonardi just manages to get 2nd place over Schinnagel, who couldn't get off from Gregaard's wheel. Munton is 4th and Mugisha 5th.
Just in behind it's a scramble for the remaining top 10 places. Meyer finishes best of the rest in 6th. Followed by Edmondson, Eiking and Thiery, with Lienhard rounding out the top 10.
Colombo Classic 
