Portugal Colonial - Denmark's Andresen swoops to win Cadel Evans Road Race

Andresen (Decathlon CMA CGM) swooped on Visma's Brennan to crown a successful Australian campaign with his second World Tour victory after a stage win in last month's Tour Down Under in Adelaide.

The 23-year-old Dane ran down Brennan in a flying finish along Geelong's Esplanade to raise his arms excitedly in celebration with Australia's Brady Gilmore (NSN Cycling) taking third.

Andresen won the first of five stages in the Tour Down Under and twice was runner-up and third in three other stages to claim the points classification for his 67th overall placing behind Australia's Jay Vine in the TDU in a successful debut for his new Decathlon team.

Andresen said he wanted to be on the wheel of his main rival Brennan in the final hectic finishing sprint in Sunday's 183.8 kilometre road race and relished his opportunity to have the last crack.

"It was a perfect lead out scenario for me for him to be forced to go early," Andresen said.

"Sometimes when you are an excellent rider like him you are forced into these positions like he had to react to every move, it was just perfect the way it worked out for me."

Andresen now has nine career pro wins and has the Tirreno-Adriatico and Belgium's Dwars door Vlaanderen next on his World Tour programme before tackling the Giro d'Italia in May.

Defending champion Swiss Mauro Schmid (Team Jayco AlUla) was prominent in the leading group in the jockeying for positions at the front and crossed the line in fourth with Eritrea's Natnael Tesfatsion (Movistar Team) fifth.

The Cadel Evans Race came down to four laps of the 21.4km finishing circuit in Geelong, punctuated by the steep 1.7km Challambra Hill climb before the final helter-skelter dash to the finish.

V.F.Barreira--PC