André Greipel has won the first stage in the Tour Down Under. The German beat Arnaud Demare and Mark Renshaw in a bunch sprint after a strong collective performance of Lotto Belisol. Thanks to his victory Greipel will start stage 2 in the leader’s jersey.

“Because only one man was riding in front, it was pretty easy to control the race, although apart from Argos there wasn’t really another team that was prepared to help. Olivier Kaisen has rode at the head of the bunch all day long and closed the gap. In the final it went up and down, and Tim Wellens and Adam Hansen have kept us in front on the hill. The last five kilometers were hectic, with a lot of turns and it went slightly downhill. Sky came to the front a bit too early and we could make use of that. At two kilometers from the end Sieberg took over, after him it were Roelandts and Henderson; we were very strong, but although it might have looked easy, it wasn’t. At 250 meters from the finish I looked over my shoulder and began. The next stage is again up and down. At eight kilometers from the finish there is a steep, tough climb, so it won’t be evident to sprint again for the victory, but who knows we might still try,” André Greipel says.