Elia Viviani (Liquigas-Cannondale) won the GP Costa degli Etruschi for the second successive year in a frozen Donoratico.

Viviani beat out Sacha Modolo (Colnago-CSF Bardiani) at the finish after one of the pre-race favourites Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre-ISD) decided against challenging the sprint due to the conditions.

During the week there had been doubts as to whether the race would go ahead, but organisers got the race going although the cyclists covered just two of the opening circuit's three laps – reducing the total distance to 169km.

Viviani admitted afterwards he had to improvise when Petacchi decided against contesting the sprint.

“I thought that Petacchi would be the man to beat and so I held his wheel from 3km to go until the last 300 metres,” he said.

“Seeing that he wasn’t going for it, I jumped onto Modolo’s wheel, because he was being led out. With 70 metres to go, I came around him.”

Eurosport