Welcome all to the amazing city of Milan for a not so casual 191.6km bike ride to Torino. The first half of the race is relatively easy going but it gets tougher and tougher as the riders reach Torino. The final 20km or so are the most up and down so this will be where the race is won or lost.
We have a strong start list here with the "experts" backing Skujins, Kinoshita and Kelderman although the others will be worth keeping an eye on, especially Hagen and Kwiatkowski.
As you'd expect, a lot of riders getting out on the attack early here! We'll have to wait and see who makes it into the day's breakaway.
A peloton of 146 for today's race and 20 of them!! Are able to get away and form a breakaway which has a gap of 2'50 with a long way to go. The riders here are:
Verschaeve, Yudha
Covi, Van Gils, Potocki
Cemazar, Jacobs, Schappi
Ulysbayev, Arensman, Finkler
Januskevicius, Wright, Granigan
Cimolai
Garcia Cortina
Manfredi
Pronskiy
Ngandamba
Christian
The gap did stretch out to 4 minutes but, with 100km still to go, it is back down to 3 minutes.
70km to go and the breakaway remains together for the time being. Their gap continues to come down as it's now 2'29.
It's not looking too promising for the breakaway as they start to really get amongst the hills with 50km to go. The gap is down another minute to 1'29.
Inside 35km to go and we start seeing attacks in the breakaway as the gap is only 1'10.
Riders start to drop off the back with 30km to go. Early casualties include Oliveira & Gesink as well as Masnada and Pernsteiner.
It's an early catch as the Tryg domestiques catch the breakaway with 25km of today's racing still ahead of us.
17km to go now and the work of Poljanski has annihilated the Peloton with the leading group now containing only 36 riders. Other than the earlier 2 mentioned leaders, all others have made the cut.
The first attacks within this group come with 13km to go but they don't look to be sticking so far.
7.5km to go for this leading group of 35. Gaudu is the one being aggressive and driving the pace at the moment, maybe setting up an attack for his team leader, Beltran?
Hagen is the next to try his luck, 5.5km to go now.
4.5km for the Norwegian which includes a short downhill before a rise up to the finish. He has a 14 second gap over the 16 man chasing group led by Beltran.
Only 2km remaining and Hagen still holds a 14 second lead over this group behind him but we are bound to see more accelerations now!
Hagen is under the kite but his gap back to this group is not much now. Beltran still leading but riders are now spread out all over the road.
700m and Hagen has lost his lead but he's not out of this just yet. Kinoshita on the inside is looking strong at the moment.
200m now and it's Kwiatkowski who is coming through the middle! De Plus is the closest challenger.
It's tight in the end but Kwiatkowski did the best at conserving his energy and it is the Pole who wins Milano - Torino.
A great ride from De Plus who takes 2nd ahead of Beltran. It's very close for 4th but Kinoshita just takes it ahead of Bystrom.
Hagen is 6th ahead of Eiking and McCarthy. It's another relative disappointment for Kelderman who only manages 9th.
Further back it's Reichenbach who takes 10th, Meyer is 11th. Jensen is 12th. More disappointment for Skujins who is only 13th while Boswell may have hoped for better in 14th.
But it's time for celebrations in the Aker - MOT camp as Michal Kwiatkowski steps onto the podium as the winner of this year's Milano - Torino.
Milano - Torino Race Report 
