Diego Ulissi (Lampre) made the most of the Tour de Pologne's decision to start their race in his native Italy as the Italian emerged as the fastest at the top of the Madonna di Ghisallo climb. Having made it into a select lead group on the steep slopes, he showed his fast finish when it all came down to a sprint from that select group and held off Darwin Atapuma (Colombia) and Rafal Majka (Saxo-Tinkoff) to take the stage win and first leader's jersey in the race.

The first stage of the Tour de Pologne had an Italian winner but nonetheless, the Polish national tour kicked off with a home win. For the first time ever, the Polish national tour starts with two mountain stages in Italy and Diego Ulissi knew how to benefit maximally from the short trip into his home country.

The Italian latched onto the back of a small group that formed as a number of riders bridged to Sergio Henao (Sky) who had launched a furious attack on the final climb. While a number of riders tried to escape - most notably Pieter Weening (Orica-GreenEdge) who got no reward for his outstanding ride - Ulissi kept his calm at the back of the group and when it all came back together for a sprint, he had no trouble leaving his rivals behind.

Despite rule changes that gives bonus seconds to the riders who pick up most points in the KOM and intermediate sprints, the win was enough for Ulissi to move himself into the overall lead. He takes a 4-second lead over second-placed Darwin Atapuma (Colombia) into tomorrow's second stage whose summit finish brings the Italian adventure of the Tour de Pologne to an end and which can be characterized as the queen stage of the race.

Starting at 13.30, you can follow the anticipated battle on CyclingQuotes.com/live.

9 riders in the early move

The 184,5km stage finished atop the Madonna di Campiglio climb and was expected to be one of the most decisive stages of the race. Early on, 9 riders built up a gap as Leonardo Duque (Colombia), Tosh Van Der Sande (Lotto-Belisol), Bartlomiej Matysiak (CCC), Bartosz Huzarski (Netapp-Endura), Serge Pauwels (Omega Pharma-Quick Step), Marco Pinotti (BMC), Cedric Pineau (FDJ) and Valerio Agnoli (Astana) got clear. For a long time, 4 riders chased behind but they were eventually picked up by the peloton which was now more than 9 minutes behind the leaders.

On the day's first climb, the lead group split in two as only Agnoli, Pineau, Pinotti, Huzarski, Pauwels and Matysiak survived the climb in the lead group. Behind, the peloton started to pick up the pace and the gap started to come down rapidly.

The lead group splinters

On the penultimate climb, the Passo del Durone, it was Colombia and later Bruno Pires (Saxo-Tinkoff) who led the chase while the front group splintered to pieces. Matysiak and Agnoli were the first to drop off and later both Pinotti and Pineau also had to give up. Pauwels and Huzarski crested the summit with a 2.25 gap as Movistar led the peloton down the descent.

As the main group finished the downhill section, it almost came to a standstill as no team had any interest in picking up the pace. That allowed the gap to grow back up to more than 3 minutes before Fabian Cancellara (Radioshack) and Mirko Selvaggi (Vacansoleil) finally decided to up the pace.

Cannondale get serious

However, it was when Cannondale gathered their troops on the front that the chase got serious. The Italian team had big ambitions for Ivan Basso and so they really put down the hammer which saw the lead of the front duo crumble away.

Cristiano Salerno led the Cannondale team onto the final climb while Huzarski fell off Pauwels' pace and back into the peloton. From there, Jose Sarmiento (Cannondale) launched an attack and overtook Pauwels but as more riders reacted it came back together. However, the increased pace had seen Bradley Wiggins (Sky) fall off.

Sky take up the gauntlet

Henao now asked his teammate Rigoberto Uran to up the pace but that didn't prevent Tomasz Marczynski (Vacansoleil) from launching an attack. Rafael Valls (Vacansoleil) and Alex Howes (Garmin) bridged and those two left Marczynski behind. However, Henao led the peloton back up to the leaders while it was now Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) who found himself dropped from the main group.

Pieter Weening (Orica-GreenEdge) now launched a promising attack and he managed to build up a gap of more than 30 seconds while behind Cameron Wurf (Cannondale) now led the peloton with his teammate Basso in his wheel. That monotonous pace was broken when Henao launched a strong attack and despite making contact briefly, Domenico Pozzovivo (Ag2r), Rafal Majka and Ion Izagirre (Euskaltel) had to let the Colombian go.

A group is formed

However, Henao couldn't keep up the pace and gradually a group formed to take up the pursuit of Weening. Henao, Pozzovivo, Majka, Izagirre, Robert Kiserlovski (Radioshack), Ben Hermans (Radioshack), Davide Rebellin (CCC), Ulissi, Chris Anker Sørensen (Saxo-Tinkoff), Basso, Atapuma, Eros Capecchi (Movistar) and Javier Moreno (Movistar) formed the group of riders still in contention for the win.

Kiserlovski, Capecchi and Sørensen attacked and while the former hell back into the group, the latter two bridged to the lone Weening. Moments later, it was back together and so Majka and Atapuma made a fruitless attack.

Weening goes again

Instead, it was Weening who once again launched off the front and the Dutchman opened up a big gap. With 500m to go, he appeared as though he could take the win but Sørensen now sacrificed his chances for teammate Majka and that brought Weening back into the fold.

Izagirre opened a long sprint but Ulissi always had everything under control. When the Italian put down the hammer, the outcome was never in doubt and he took a convincing win ahead of Atapuma and Majka to move himself into the first leader's jersey with another tough stage in the mountains coming up tomorrow.

Result:

1. Diego Ulissi 4.59.32

2. Darwin Atapuma

3. Rafal Majka

4. Eros Capecchi

5. Ivan Basso

6. Domenico Pozzovivo

7. Ion Izagirre

8. Alex Howes

9. Ben Hermans

10. Pieter Weening

General classification:

1. Diego Ulissi 4.59.22

2. Chris Anker Sørensen

3. Darwin Atapuma +0.04

4. Rafal Majka +0.06

5. Eros Capecchi +0.10

6. Ivan Basso

7. Domenico Pozzovivo

8. Ion Izagirre

9. Alex Howes

10. Ben Hermans

Points classification:

1. 1. Diego Ulissi 20

2. Darwin Atapuma 19

3. Rafal Majka 18

4. Eros Capecchi 17

5. Ivan Basso 16

Mountains classification:

1. Bartosz Huzarski 15

2. Chris Anker Sørensen 10

3. Serge Pauwels 10

4. Eros Capecchi 7

5. Marco Pinotti 6

Sprints classification:

1. Bartosz Huzarski 5

2. Serge Pauwels 4

3. Leonardo Duque 3

4. Cedric Pineau 2

5. Tosh Van Der Sande 2

Teams classification:

1. Radioshack 14.59.59

2. Team Saxo-Tinkoff +2.14

3. Movistar

4. BMC +3.46

5. Ag2r +4.11