Brennan thunders to uphill victory in Vuelta a Burgos opener

Matthew Brennan produced a sharp uphill sprint to win stage 1 of the Vuelta a Burgos after his Visma | Lease a Bike teammate Ben Tulett delivered a perfect lead-out on the Alto del Castillo.

Tulett’s strength was such that he took second place ahead of Laurence Pithie (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), while Jordan Labrosse (Decathlon CMA CGM) took fourth.

Marc Brustenga (Equipo Kern Pharma) was the first to strike out on the final haul to the line, attacking forcefully with 700m to go and opening a sizeable gap.

Tulett, however, had the situation under control, and he dialled up the pace carefully to chase down Brustenga and lead out Brennan, who becomes the first race leader.

The stage was animated by a break composed of Josh Burnett (Burgos Burpellet BH), Javier Ibáñez (Caja Rural - Seguros RGA), Valentin Ferron (Cofidis) and Unai Aznar (Euskaltel - Euskadi).

They built a maximum lead of 3:15 over the peloton, and they retained a buffer of more than half a minute after Aznar led them over the Alto El Aguilón inside the final 17km. The quartet continued to collaborate smoothly on the approach to Burgos, and they still had 30 seconds in hand as they entered the final 5km.

Visma | Lease a Bike were prominent in leading the chase, however, and their efforts helped to reel in the escapees with a little over a kilometre remaining, just ahead of the final kick to the line on the category 3 Alto del Castillo.