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San Remo - Australian Simon Gerrans put a miserable start to the season behind him when he snatched the overall leader's pink jersey at the Giro d'Italia after his Orica-GreenEDGE outfit won the opening team time trial on Saturday.
Gerrans, who has suffered four crashes this season, breaking his collarbone and fracturing his elbow, was first across the line as Orica-GreenEDGE clocked a best time of 19 minutes 26 seconds over 17.6 kilometres between San Lorenzo al Mare and San Remo.
The Australian team beat Alberto Contador's Tinkoff-Saxo by seven seconds, with the Spaniard being the best placed of the top contenders after the first stage.
"We're very happy, we put a lot of work into this team time trial even if we're not a team of specialists," Australian Michael Rogers of Tinkoff-Saxo told reporters.
Contador is looking to become the first man to achieve a Giro/Tour de France double since the late Marco Pantani of Italy in 1998.
He leads Italian Fabio Aru, third overall last year, by six seconds after the local hope's Astana team took third place.
"I'm very happy with the way we rode. We can do anything during the race," Aru said.
Colombian Rigoberto Uran, runner-up in the last two editions, lies 12 seconds behind Contador after Etixx-Quick Step finished fourth 19 seconds off the pace.
Australian Richie Porte, Contador's main rival in the Giro, suffered a setback when Team Sky ended up ninth, 27 seconds behind the winners.
Standings after Saturday's first stage of the Giro d'Italia, a 17.6km team time-trial at San Remo:
Team time-trial
1. Orica 19min 26sec (average: 54.339 km/h), 2. Tinkoff at 07sec, 3. Astana 13, 4. Etixx 19, 5. Movistar 21, 6. IAM 25, 7. BMC 25, 8. FDJ 26, 9. Sky 27, 10. Katusha 27, 11. Trek 29, 12. Lotto 31, 13. Lotto NL 36, 14. Bardiani 37, 15. CCC 45, 16. AG2R La Mondiale 48, 17. Giant 49, 18. Southeast 52, 19. Cannondale 53, 20. Nippo 57, 21. Lampre 59, 22. Androni 1:03
Overall standings
1. Simon Gerrans (AUS/ORI) 19min 26sec, 2. Michael Matthews (AUS/ORI) at 0:00, 3. Michael Hepburn (AUS/ORI) 0:00, 4. Pieter Weening (NED/ORI) 0:00, 5. Simon Clarke (AUS/ORI) 0:00, 6. Esteban Chaves (COL/ORI) 0:00, 7. Manuele Boaro (ITA/TIN) 0:07, 8. Roman Kreuziger (CZE/TIN) 0:07, 9. Michael Rogers (AUS/TIN) 0:07, 10. Alberto Contador (ESP/TIN) 0:07, 11. Christopher Juul-Jensen (DEN/TIN) 0:07, 12. Ivan Rovnyi (RUS/TIN) 0:07, 13. Fabio Aru (ITA/AST) 0:13, 14. Paolo Tiralongo (ITA/AST) 0:13, 15. Diego Rosa (ITA/AST) 0:13, 16. Dario Cataldo (ITA/AST) 0:13, 17. Andrey Zeits (KAZ/AST) 0:13, 18. Luis Leon Sanchez (ESP/AST) 0:13, 19. Tanel Kangert (EST/AST) 0:13, 20. Mikel Landa (ESP/AST) 0:13
Selected:
22. Tom Boonen (BEL/ETI) 0:19, 7. Rigoberto Uran (COL/ETI) 0:19, 57. Richie Porte (AUS/SKY) 0:27
