Luka Mezgec (Argos-Shimano) crowned a beautiful first professional season with a win in the final WorldTour race of 2013 when he beat pre-race favourite Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ) and Moreno Hofland (Belkin) in the final sprint of the Tour of Beijing. Benat Intxausti (Movistar) finished safely in the bunch to take the overall victory ahead of Daniel Martin (Garmin-Sharp) and David Lopez (Sky).

Luka Mezgec has shown great potential in his first season as a professional with Argos-Shimano as he has taken numerous top results in big WorldTour races. Until today, the big win had, however, eluded the fast Slovenian.

Today he finally got things right on the final day of WorldTour racing in the 2013 season when he won the final stage of the Tour of Beijing. The Slovenian celebrated his contract extension which was announced yesterday, by beating pre-race favourite Nacer Bouhanni in a close sprint.

Mezgec benefited from his strong Argos train which took control of the peloton inside the final 2km of the race. However, his lead-out man Tom Veelers ran out of power a bit too early in the headwind and was overtaken by Jens Mouris (Orica-GreenEDGE).

Bouhanni was quick to react and moved onto the wheel of the Dutchman while Mezgec managed to get into the slipstream of the FDJ sprinter. Bouhanni opened his sprint and appeared to be in the perfect position to take his third win but Mezgec proved his fast speed by coming around his rival just before the line. A very close battle for third was won by Moreno Hofland who narrowly held off Matti Breschel (Saxo-Tinkoff),  Roberto Ferrari (Lampre-Merida) and Alexey Tsatevich (Katusha).

Benat Intxausti finished safely in the bunch and so the Movistar rider was crowned winner of the final WorldTour race of the season. There was no change in the top 10 on today's stage and so Daniel Martin and David Lopez took the minor two spots on the podium. Bouhanni won the points jersey, Damiano Caruso (Cannondale) the mountains jersey, Romain Bardet (Ag2r) the youth classification and BMC the teams classification.

The race brought the 2013 WorldTour to an end and Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) wins the season-long competition for the second year in a row. Martin moves into 6th while Costa takes 9th by virtue of their strong showings in China. Movistar's fantastic performances in China allows them to dispose Sky and take the win in the teams classification.

A flat stage

The third edition of the Tour of Beijing was brought to a close with a short 117km in the centre of Beijing. It started on the famous Tiananmen Square and finished with 12 laps on a 7,5km finishing circuit around the Olympic stadium.

The riders were intent on putting on a show on their final day of WorldTour racing in the 2013 season and so the race was off to a really fast and aggressive start. While attacks were launched in both sides of the roads and the pace was fast, race leader Benat Intxausti had a mechanical was safely helped back to the main group by teammate Jose Ivan Gutierrez.

Flecha and Pinotti in a farewell break

Finally, 5 riders managed to separate themselves from the peloton when Juan Antonio Flecha (Vacansoleil) - in the final race of his career - Marco Pinotti - in the final road race of his career (he will ride Sunday's GP des Nations time trial) - Christian Meier (Orica-GreenEDGE), Olivier Kaisen (Lotto Belisol) and Manuele Boaro (Saxo-Tinkoff) were allowed to build up a gap. However, the peloton was in no mood to allow such a strong break too much leeway and kept the gap around the 1-minute mark for most of the day.

Pinotti beat Flecha, Meier and Kaisen in the first intermediate sprint. The Italian was only 41 seconds behind Intxausti on GC and so was the virtual leader of the race and this forced Movistar into action. The Spanish team took control of the peloton and kept the gap stable due to hard work by Jose Ivan Gutierrez, Jesus Herrada, Alex Dowsett, Giovanni Visconti and Andrey Amador.

The sprint teams start to chase

Despite their efforts, the gap started to grow and by the time, they crossed the finish line to start the 7th lap on the circuit, the gap was 1.35. It even reached 1.45 and this forced the sprint teams into action. FDJ put Johan Le Bon on the front while Argos-Shimano asked Yan Dong Xing to up the pace.

Their work had an effect and the gap now started to come down. With 31km to go, Cannondale and Katusha also started to chase as Cameron Wurf and Mikhail Ignatiev were now also taking turns on the front.

Meier attacks

Wurf, Ignatiev, Visconti, Herrada, Le Bon, Xing and Jussi Veikkanen (FDJ) combined forces to gradually reel in the break. When they started the penultimate lap, the gap was less than 30 seconds and so Meier decided that it was time to set off on his own.

The Canadian stayed ahead for a little while but his former companions worked well together to catch him just before the penultimate passage of the finish line. As they started the final lap, Pinotti decided that he had had enough and fell back to the peloton which was being led by Wurf and Jeremy Roy (FDJ).

Meiers tries again

Meier tried another attack but this time Flecha was quick to respond and so the Canadian never got away. A few moments later, Movistar took control of the peloton with Gutierrez and Dowsett and they significantly reduced the gap.

This signaled that it was time for Omega Pharma-Quick Step to play their card and they lined their entire team out on the front of the peloton. Julien Vermote and Michal Golas both took major turns on the front and brought the breakaway back into the fold.

Tony Martin tries his hand

Next in the line was Tony Martin and when he hit the front, his teammates slowed down, allowing the defending champion to get a gap. Belkin were quick to react and combined forces with Ag2r to chase down the world TT champion.

Movistar, Lampre and Belkin all had short stints on the front but with 2km to go, 4 Argos riders took control. They were greatly challenged by the FDJ train and those two teams fought hard alongside each other for a little while.

Argos won the battle but Bouhanni was quick to react and positioned himself on the wheel of Alessandro Petacchi (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) who was on Mezgec's wheel. When Veelers faded, Mouris hit the front, giving way to Bouhanni who opened the sprint that was eventually won by Mezgec.

Result:

1. Luka Mezgec 2.23.56

2. Nacer Bouhanni

3. Moreno Hofland

4. Matti Breschel

5. Roberto Ferrari

6. Alexey Tsatevich

7. Alessandro Petacchi

8. Rüdiger Selig

9. Yauheni Hutarovich

10. Bernhard Eisel

General classification:

1. Benat Intxausti 19.35.46

2. Daniel Martin +0.10

3. David Lopez +0.13

4. Rui Costa +0.18

5. Romain Bardet +0.24

6. Tony Martin

7. Jan Bakelants +0.26

8. Robert Gesink

9. Ivan Basso

10. Garikoitz Bravo +0.31

Points classification:

1. Nacer Bouhanni 52

2. Luka Mezgec 36

3. Matti Breschel 33

4. Alessandro Petacchi 33

5. Roberto Ferrari 31

Mountains classification:

1. Damiano Caruso 49

2. Wesley Sulzberger 35

3. Jose Ivan Gutierrez 18

4. Chad Beyer 17

5. Olivier Kaisen 16

Youth classification:

1. Romain Bardet 19.36.10

2. Garikoitz Bravo +0.07

3. Carlos Betancur

4. Jan Polanc +0.17

5. Dominik Nerz

Teams classification:

1. BMC 58.49.11

2. Movistar +0.04

3. Ag2r +0.18

4. Radioshack +0.29

5. Sky +0.54