22-year-old Adam Yates has capped off a successful Tirreno-Adriatico, finishing ninth overall following today’s closing time trial in San Benedetto del Tronto.

Yates started the final day in sixth place courtesy of a strong ride on the queen stage where the young Briton battled amongst the world’s best climbers in snow-covered conditions for seventh line honours.

Completing today’s ten-kilometre time trial in 12minutes 23seconds, Yates fought bravely to maintain the top-ten goal set out prior to the Tour start.

“It was a very positive week in general for the team,” sport director Matt White said. “Our number one goal was to look after Adam as much as we could during the week and even without a team’s time trial he has done an incredible ride in his first WorldTour event of the year.

“How he handles himself on the big climbs against the world’s best, that’s definitely one of the most pleasing things.

“And going head-to-head against guys considerably older than him which like we said pre-race, it was one of the most competitive fields of racing at the moment.”

Former Australian time trial champion Michael Hepburn finished sixth as ORICA-GreenEDGE’s best performer today, whilst Fabian Cancellara (Trek Factory Racing) was fastest. Nairo Quintana (Movistar Team) maintained his overall lead to win the Tour.

“I think that was the best time trial I have seen from Michael Hepburn in Europe,” White said.

“Sixth place in a world class field at the end of a hard week is a very good sign coming into Belgium and for his form in general.”

In more encouraging news for ORICA-GreenEDGE, Danish neo-pro Magnus Cortalso rode impressively in his fir WorldTour race, highlighted with a fourth place on stage six.

“Our young guys never cease to amaze me how they regularly step up for big occasions,” White said.

“We have a very young team and they are continuingly improving and continuingly surprising and that is a great sign for their future development and the team’s development.”