It was Fabian Cancellara’s third victory. He defeated two Etixx-QuickStep riders on the narrow streets of Siena.
The race was held on 5th March, this was the 10th edition. It started and ended in Siena and included 9 gravel road sectors. Demonstrating the increasing popularity of the race, several cycling superstars were among the participants, like Peter Sagan (Tinkoff), Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), Greg van Avermaet (BMC) or the two-time winner Fabian Cancellara (Trek-Segafredo).
The first breakaway group was caught in the 5th sector (San Martino in Grania), but immediately formed another group with Gianluca Brambilla (Etixx-QuickStep), Andriy Grivko (Astana), Brent Bookwalter (BMC), Maxime Monfort (Lotto-Soudal) and Salvatore Puccio (Team Sky). Puccio lost contact due to mechanical problems. Also, Grivko dropped on the 6th sector, but he managed to get back a bit later. Meanwhile, Astana, Movistar, and Sky led the chasing in the quite reduced peloton ( a.k.a the first chasing group).
In the 7th sector, with 23 km to go, Brambilla attacked the three other riders of the leading group, only Bookwalter could go with for a while. As the chasing group reached the 8th sector, Peter Sagan attacked, first Zdenek Stybar, then a bit later Fabian Cancellara joined him. Also, Brambilla remained a member of the final leading group of the race. Eventually, he managed to deliver the last big attack with 8 km to go. (Before this, with 14 km to go, Cancellara had an attempt, but he failed thanks to the reaction of Stybar.)
The chasing group included among others Greg Van Avermaet, Alejandro Valverde, Michal Kwiatkowski (Sky), Vincenzo Nibali, Petr Vakoc(Etixx-QuickStep), Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) and a very impressive Tiesj Benoot (Lotto-Soudal).
Brambilla crossed the 1-kilometre mark with an advantage of 8 sec. While Sagan lost contact cca. 500 m to go, Cancellara managed to get in the first position before the final corner. In the end, Stybar was his strongest rival, but not enough strong to defeat him. Cancellara crossed the finish line first and became the first rider winning the race 3 times.
Top10
1 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Trek-Segafredo 4:39:35
2 Zdenek Stybar (Cze) Etixx – Quick-Step
3 Gianluca Brambilla (Ita) Etixx – Quick-Step 0:00:04
4 Peter Sagan (Svk) Tinkoff Team 0:00:13
5 Petr Vakoc (Cze) Etixx – Quick-Step 0:00:34
6 Greg Van Avermaet (Bel) BMC Racing Team 0:00:37
7 Diego Ulissi (Ita) Lampre – Merida 0:00:41
8 Tiesj Benoot (Bel) Lotto Soudal
9 Lars Petter Nordhaug (Nor) Team Sky
10 Alejandro Valverde (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:50