Peter Sagan (Cannondale) continued his domination of the inaugural edition of the Tour of Alberta when he won today's first stage of the Canadian stage race. A late acceleration by Eric Young (Optum) took the Slovakian by surprise but the race leader produced an impressive burst of speed on the final climb inside the final 500m to come around the fading American who held on for 2nd.

Peter Sagan has dominated the biggest North American stage races this season, clocking up numerous stage races in both the Tour of California and the USA Pro Challange. The trend continues this week in the inaugural edition of Canada's biggest stage race, the Tour of Alberta.

Having already crushed the opposition in yesterday's prologue, Sagan made another display of power when he won today's first stage of the race. With only 5 riders to support him, the Cannondale leader was left to fight for himself but he kept his calm in the tough finale that included a short, steep 200m climb inside the final 500m.

It appeared as though a surprise was in store when Eric Young slipped clear on the climb, opening up a solid gap on the peloton. Sagan was forced to hit the front from far out, giving his rivals the perfect opportunity to deny the favourite the win.

However, no one was able to stay on the wheel of the fabulous race leader and he had no trouble coming around Young a few metres before the line, thus taking the stage win and the 10 bonus seconds that opened his overall lead over 2nd placed Rohan Dennis (Garmin) up to 23 seconds. Young held on to take 2nd while the young Belkin sprinter Moreno Hofland (Belkin) completed the podium.

Sagan takes his leader's jersey into tomorrow's 174,8km second stage. A categorized climb inside the final 25km and three laps on a hilly circuit offer the perfect launch pads for attacks but a sprint finish is once again expected, thus offering Sagan a perfect opportunity to further pad his lead.

An aggressive start

The 158km first stage was mostly flat and finished with 3 laps on a 4km circuit in Chamrose that had a small climb just before the finish line. With no categorized climbs on the route, the only real danger was the strong wind that could blow the race to pieces in the exposed rural farmland.

The stage was off to an extremely aggressive start and it took a long time for the day's early break to be established. Nic Hamilton (Jelly Belly) was the first to get a noticeable gap but the young American was quickly reeled in.

4 riders get clear

Finally, the elastic snapped when Jeremy Vennell (Bissell) attacked and he got company from William Clarke (Argos-Shimano), Marc Goos (Belkin) and Jeremy Powers (Jelly Belly). Those four riders were allowed to build up a 2-minute gap before Cannondale started to control the race. The Italian team kept the gap stable at around that mark for most of the day and it was clear that they didn't risk anything at all.

With 25km to go, attacks started to fly in the peloton with numerous teams launching riders off the front. On a number of occasions, bigger groups went up the road and Cannondale had to use a lot of power to bring it back together.

Cannondale back in control

Sagan's team got things under control, and they had reduced the gap to less than a minute by the time they crossed the line to start the first lap on the circuit. Up ahead, Clarke attacked while Goos set off in pursuit.

Cannondale kept the pace high on the first two laps and just before the third and penultimate passage of the finish line, Clarke was swallowed up as the final escapee. Francisco Mancebo (5-Hour) energy was now giving it his all in the peloton, trying to set up his sprinters Andres Diaz and Shawn Milne for the win.

A surprise for Hesjedal

Crowd favourite Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin) made an attack and had a slight gap when he crossed the finish line. Unaware of the fact that one lap still remained, he raised his arms in celebration before quickly realizing his mistake and falling back to the 5-Hour-led peloton.

Sagan was always well-placed behind the 5-Hour Energy riders and by the time, they hit the finishing straight for the final time, the Slovakian was in third position. Tomas Vaitkus (Orica-GreenEDGE) was driving the pace, preparing the sprint for teammate Aidis Kruopis.

Young launched his surprise attack inside the final 500m, and no team had any domestique left to chase down the fast American. Sagan had to react by himself and the Slovakian did an outstanding job to not only close the gap and come around his rivals, he also left his fellow sprinters behind and so could take a very convincing stage win.

Result:

1. Peter Sagan 3.30.46

2. Eric Young

3. Moreno Hofland

4. Ryan Anderson

5. Luka Mezgec

6. Brent Bookwalter

7. Fabian Wegmann

8. Mathias Friedemann

9. Tobias Ludvigsson

10. John Murphy

General classification:

1. Peter Sagan 3.39.04

2. Rohan Dennis +0.23

3. Tobias Ludvigsson +0.24

4. Cadel Evans +0.30

5. Brent Bookwalter +0.31

6. Pieter Weening +0.39

7. Patrick Gretsch

8. Tom Zirbel +0.40

9. Ryder Hesjedal

10. Robert Gesink +0.41