Irish rider Matt Teggart has ended the opening stage of Tour of Britain with a classification jersey for his breakaway efforts on the 181.3km stage from Aberdeen to Glenshee Ski Centre.
Teggart's team mate, and Irish champion, Rory Townsend, was in the 50-rider peloton sprinting for victory, on what was a tough finish, and he placed 13th on the stage.
On a wet and cold day in Scotland, WiV-SunGod's Teggart was active off the front of the bunch in the early phase of the race and when the six-man breakaway that dominated the stage got clear, the Irishman was in it.
Once in that move, he contributed to the workload to get it clear and then set about hoovering up the points at the intermediate sprints. He took the maximum number of points on offer - winning the sprints at Inverurie after 27.5km, Alford after 91.6km and Ballater after 139.7km.
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In that breakaway with Teggart was his team mate Jacob Scott as well Matt Gibson and Stephen Bassett (Human Powered Health) and Martin Urianstad (Uno-X Pro Cycling).
Those six broke early and settled in for a long shift out front in the wind and rain, with their gap growing just over 4½ minutes with 50km done. The breakaway riders competing for the sprint and climbers' primes did not undermine their cooperation in between those points.
After reaching its maximum point around 50km into the stage, the gap then stabilised and began to reduce as Ineos Grenadiers took up the chase in the peloton, later helped by Israel Premier Tech. With 90km covered, the efforts of those big teams was clear, with the gap to Teggart's breakaway group down to two minutes.
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However, the riders out front were clearly intent on staying clear to take the sprints and climbers jerseys after the stage and they were not caught until the final kilometre of the race.
The final 6km was uphill, with the gradients at their steepest in the last 3km. The breakaway group still had 40 seconds starting that climb.
However, Alex Dowsett - the Israel Premier Tech rider who is stepping away from road racing - put in a big turn on the front and cut the breakaway's advantage by half before they reached the toughest gradient.
That gradient - combined with the fatigue of a day out front and the speed of the peloton - saw the breakaway swallowed up inside the final kilometre,
From that point it was Corbin Strong (Israel-Premier Tech) who proved best in the drag race to the line; claiming the stage victory ahead of Omar Fraile (Ineos Grenadiers) and Anders Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team).
Teggart now leads the sprints classification ahead of tomorrow's 175,2km stage 2 from Hawick to Duns. The Irishman has a total of nine points. Gibson is 2nd with five points and Scott is 3rd with four points.
