André Greipel (HTC-Columbia) surged to victory in Thursday’s Trofeo Magaluf-Palmanova to close out the five-day Mallorca Challenge.
The Tour Down Under champ pounced to his fifth win of the young season in the attack-riddled final day of racing on Spain’s Mallorca island. Greipel held off Koldo Fernández (Euskaltel-Euskadi) while Manuel Cardoso (Footon-Servetto-Fuji) came across the line third.
“I wasn’t expecting this win. Before the stage I thought I’d just try to hang on for as long as I could in the hillier parts, but I got over the climbs in a lot better shape than I’d thought possible,” Greipel said afterwards. “In the last 40 kilometers my HTC-Columbia teammates did a lot of chasing of the riders who’d broken away and that way we had everything under control in the last part of the stage. There were three roundabouts in the last five kilometers where things got a bit more complicated again.”
