Sunday 20 September 2015 21:41, UK
BMC Racing beat Etixx – Quick-Step to retain their men’s team time trial title on the opening day of the UCI Road World Championships in Richmond, United States.
The American squad stopped the clock on a 38.8km course in 42min 7sec, which was 11 seconds faster than runners-up Etixx - Quick-Step and 30 seconds ahead of third-placed Movistar, who had Britain's Alex Dowsett in their line-up.
Team Sky had to limp along with two injured riders following a training crash on Sunday and could only finish 1min 41sec down in ninth.
BMC Racing rider Taylor Phinney said: "It was a hard race. It was hard to keep the finish line in mind, but we did it. We wanted to do this. I'm a little bit at a loss for words.
"This is a huge goal for us as a team and I feel fortunate that I could just make this team. If you had asked me a month ago if I would be here as team time trial world champion, it's surreal."
Five teams were separated by just five seconds at the first intermediate split, with BMC and Etixx locked together on the same time, but BMC then pulled away in the next sector and led Etixx by 12 seconds at the second split.
Etixx fought back and had halved their deficit to six seconds by the third and final split, setting up a potentially tight finale, but BMC accelerated again and, despite losing two of their six riders in the closing kilometres, they held on for a commanding victory.
Tinkoff-Saxo finished last, 8min 12sec down, after two of their riders fell heavily in a crash and the remaining three had to stop to wait for them.
Earlier on Sunday, German team Velocio-SRAM retained the women's world team time trial title by beating Lizzie Armitstead's Boels Dolmans by six seconds in a closely fought battle.
Rabo-Liv finished 56 seconds back in third, while British team Wiggle Honda, whose line-up included Dani King, finished 1min 10sec down in fourth.
The World Championships continue on Monday with the junior women's and under-23 men's individual time trials.
Men's world team time trial result
1 BMC Racing, 42:07
2 Etixx - Quick-Step, +11sec
3 Movistar, +30
4 Orica-GreenEdge, +53
5 Giant-Alpecin, +1:03
6 LottoNL-Jumbo, +1:17
7 Lotto Soudal, +1:26
8 Astana, +1:37
9 Team Sky, +1:41
10 Trek Factory Racing, +1:46
Women's world team time trial result
1 Velocio-SRAM, 47:35
2 Boels Dolmans, +6sec
3 rabo-Liv, +56
4 Wiggle Honda, +1:10
5 TWENTY16 p/b Sho-Air, +2:05
6 UnitedHealthcare, +2:51
7 Orica-AIS, +2:54
8 BTC City Ljubljana, +3:03
9 Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies, +3:21
10 Hitec Products, +3:32
