Arnaud Demare WIns Milan-San Remo

Last updated : 19 March 2016 By CNS Sport

FDJ's Arnaud Demare has won the 107th Milan-San Remo race.

The first Monument race over a 291km course took place with a very strong field and had an early departure.

Soon after the flag dropped, a break comprising of Gediminas Bagdonas (Ag2r La Mondiale), Serghei Tvetcov (Androni Sidermec), Mirco Maestri (Bardiani CSF), Jan Barta (Bora Argon 18), Adrian Hurek (CCC-SPRANDI-POLKOWICE), Roger Kluge (IAM Cycling), Matteo Bono (Lampre - Merida), Samuele Conti (Southeast - Venezuela), Maarten Tjallingii (LottoNL - Jumbo), Andrea Peron (Team Novo Nordisk) and Marco Coledan (Trek Segafredo) formed and they were 10.45 ahead after fifty kilometres.

After 67kms and the gap standing at 8.27, there was news of a landslide near Arezano, near Genova which meant a 9km diversion via the motorway and added four kiloemetres on to the race distance.

With a hundred kilometres left, the gap was at 5.08 and 3.50 twenty kilometres later.

Onto the Capo Berta and the break started to disintergrate with the leader's now only a minute clear with 38kms left.

Marco Haller of Katusha was involved in a crash along with Marangoni of Cannondale but those in the peloton were trying to make the bridge to the escapers.

Julien Vermote of Etixx Quick Step was another who crashed before Bagdonas dropped back to the peloton who were heading towards the Cipressa climb.

Team Sky's Peter Kennaugh and Michael Matthews of Orica GreenEdge were caught in a crash along with Geraint Thomas of Team Sky.

On the climb and with 25.1kms to go, the six that were left up front were caught and it was Visconti who was first over the climb and soon joined by Ian Stannard of Team Sky.

Daneil Oss, Montaguti and Sabatini joined them on the descent and with sixteen kilometres left, the five had a sixteen second lead on a sunny day.

Steve Cummings of Dimenson Data led the peloton in the chase of these five who were caught with 11.4kms to go.

Onto the Poggio di San Remo climb of 3.7kms with average gradients of 3.7% but ramps of 8% in parts.

Daniel Oss attacked again with team mate Greg Van Avermaet following before the Welshman Luke Rowe led the riders with just under ten kilometres to go.

Fedi of Southeast, Tony Gallopin and Michal Kwiatkowski made attacks on the climb with the Pole who rides for the Team Sky first over.

Vincenzo Nibali led the chase on the hairpin bends, one of which took down Anthony Roux of FDJ. 

With three kilometres left, Kwiatkowski had a four second lead and it was the same time a kilometre later. Fabian Cancellera was sent to bring him back and he did to set up Edvald Boasson Hagen who led going into the final kilometres. Van Avermaet caught him.

There was a crash with Gaviria going down with 500 minutes to go.The sprint continued and up came Arnaud Demare of FDJ to beat Team Sky's Ben Swift and win the race in a time of 6.54.45, followed by Jurgen Roelandts of Lotto Soudal, Nacer Bouhanni of Cofidis, Greg Van Avermaet of BMC Racing Team, Alexander Kristoff of Katusha,  Heinrich Haussler of IAM Cycling, Filippo Pozzato of Southeast - Venezuela, Sonny Colbrelli of Bardiani and Matteo Trentin of Etixx - Quick-Step.

Demare became the first Frenchman to win the race since 1995 and said: "This is incredible. There are days like this one in which everything works despite the occasional hiccup, like crashing at the bottom of the Cipressa.

"I made it across at the bottom of the Poggio and the entire way I felt fantastic. I became the under-23 world champion in similar conditions after crashing.

"I'm delighted to win Milano-Sanremo. This is a big one and has been running for over a century. It's extraordinary. I'm extremely happy."