MTN-Qhubeka have lined up at the Vuelta a Burgos to fine-tune their condition for the Vuelta a Espana and target the GC with climber Sergio Pardilla. The team got the race off to a solid start as Pardilla, Daniek Teklehaimanot and Jacques Van Rensburg all finished near the front in the explosive uphill sprint on stage 1.

Juan Jose Lobato (Movistar) won the opening stage of the Vuelta a Burgos by being the fastest in the technical uphill sprint. Lobato came in ahead of Daniel Moreno (Katusha) and Thomas Damuseau (Giant-Shimano) earlier today. The tight and twisty uphill finale saw a few splits in the peloton but both Sergio Pardilla and Daniel Teklehaimanot would finish as part of the lead group, with Jacques Janse van Rensburg also in the mix.

The warm Spanish weather saw 4 riders get away virtually from the gun today, Lluis Más (Caja Rural), Mirko Tedeschi (Neri Sottoli), Ibai Salas (Burgos) and Victor Etxebarria (Euskadi) were the 4 escapees. Their lead quickly grew to 2 minutes but then Movistar made sure that 2 minutes was all they were getting for the day. The final 12km’s took in 2 cat 3 climbs and this was were the race sparked back into life. The quartet was caught after numerous attacks by Astana and Caja Rural. As the peloton hit the final km the race was all together for the uphill sprint.

Team MTN-Qhubeka p/b Samsung had rode confidently all day, placing it’s top riders in the front 20 positions all day. Linus Gerdemann could be seen to be doing a great job keeping the team out of trouble in the final 20km’s. The short and violent uphill sprint did not suit the pure climbers and so the team did well to not lose any real time to the GC contenders.

"The stage was quite easy for the first 100km with a break of 4 going right after the start," Van Rensburg said. "Movistar was controlling the whole day with a steady tempo. The last 20km’s was really fast with a tailwind from 20km to 10km to go.

"There was a massive high speed crash in the middle of the group at 15km to go, luckily I just missed it but I had to chase for 10km just to get back while the speed was really high.

"Daniel, Sergio and myself managed to finish quite high up in the end after Linus and Youcef [Reguigui] did a great job before the finish. I’m happy with my form at the moment and this tour will give me the final prep I need for the Vuelta."

"The team looked after Sergio really well today, especially because there was quite a strong crosswind during the stage," Director Sportif Manel Lacambra said. "Linus did a great job to place Sergio in a good position at the bottom of the climb.

"The climb was a bit too short an explosive for Sergio. We need to wait for stage 3 where the climb is longer and harder. In general the team rode well, we know we are missing the race intensity because most of the guys last raced at Tour de Suisse but it will get better every stage."