The opening stage here in Norway is the first of 2 sprint stages. A great opportunity for one of the sprinter to wear the leaders jersey.
The favourites are the sprinters we focused on in the Preview. They will need to ensure their teams control the breakaway and set them up well in the finale.
Fans all over the place here at the start line clearly expecting a good race!
We pass through the first sprint point of the day with 154km remaining in the stage. These 3 riders are our only ones in the breakaway which has a 3'08 lead. Meeus wins the sprint ahead of Poljanec and Teunissen.
Meeus had the best positioning going into the KOM sprint and it's the same order as the sprint. 117km to go and the gap is 4 minutes.
The Peloton brings the gap down to 2 minutes as we hit 50km remaining.
Poljanec wins the 2nd and final sprint point. 1'51 with 40km to go.
Meeus wins the KOM and will wear the KOM jersey going into Stage 2.
22km remaining and the gap down below 1 minute.
The catch is made with 8km to go. We will have a sprint!
2km remaining. It's King Power on the left, Tinkoff on the right, and all the individual sprinters through the middle.
Under the kite and Darbinyan put in an acceleration early which drags Hsu along with him. Howard is closest.
Hsu left in the wind far too early. The 4 riders to his right looking the most promising although more coming from deep as well.
Hodeg and AKA the best placed with 400m to go.
It will be one of these 2 as they pull clear with 100m left.
And Kragh Andersen wins it! The Dane timed his run well here. Hodeg takes 2nd, his manager will finally have a sprint result to be more pleased about!
Aberasturi came flying up for 3rd ahead of Houle. Contreras is 5th.
Tour of Norway - Stage 1 Report 
