The opening prologue of Tour de l’Eurométropole gave no moment of respite, as the riders embarked on a 7.7km parcours with an uphill finish. Tinkoff-Saxo’s Manuele Boaro took 11th place, 23 seconds of stage winner Alexis Gougeard and the outfit now looks to regain lost seconds in the stages to come.

After the flat-out initial battle, team sports director Lars Michaelsen tells that the outcome on the day had left Tinkoff-Saxo wanting more but underlines that the coming stages seems to provide challenging terrain.

“Boaro finished 11th with 23 seconds to the winner Gougeard, who is an upcoming talent. We could see that the wind picked up during the afternoon and that also influenced Boaro. However, that’s the game and it was the same for all the late starters. We had hoped for a bit more, Brutt was 47 seconds behind and Trusov 56 seconds and we are now in a situation, where we must make up time or target a stage win. Boaro is 23 seconds from the lead, we will naturally try to regain seconds but this is a race that is decided with minor margins”, says Lars Michaelsen.

Stage 1 Thursday presents the riders with 161 mainly flat kilometers from La Louviere to Chievres. Lars Michaelsen notes that the team will be looking for opportunities.

“Tomorrow is fairly flat but we must seek out our own chances. That’s also the case for the other stages - if we encounter any strong winds, it will naturally create opportunities. We are in a tricky position now with Boaro, where he is too close in the GC for the main contenders to let him escape but it will be interesting to see what possibilities we can create”, finishes Lars Michaelsen.