Every cloud has a silver lining, the saying goes, and at the rain-soaked opening stage of the Volta a Catalunya, Visma-Lease a Bike could hardly have found a better way to bounce back from injured Jonas Vingegaard's unavoidable absence as his substitute teammate, 19-year-old Matthew Brennan, clinched his first WorldTour victory in spectacular last-ditch style.
"It's a shame Jonas is not here and that he crashed and that he's out of the race but he needs to recover and it's a good step for him to do that towards his next goals," Brennan said. "For me, it's a privilege to be racing on his behalf."
"It was an interesting phone call: I was like - Jonas? But I'm not a climber," is how the Briton described the moment he was informed by Visma-Lease a Bike management last week he would be standing in for the double Tour de France winner at Catalunya.
"[But] It's great for the team to have a slightly different ambition here: as well as GC we now go for stages, so it's really nice to be here."
Best known as a one-day specialist and blessed with a blazing sprint finish that allowed him to win a tough cobbled race like the GP de Denain - nicknamed the mini-Paris Roubaix - last week, Brennan found himself in very different circumstances as the peloton stretched out and shattered on the notoriously tricky descent to the finish town on San Feliu de Guixols.
"It was a really tricky situation. We'd managed as a team to get into the right position coming into the final and then on the descent an Alpecin rider was out there on their own and I had an Alpecin rider on my wheel, what can you do in that sort of situation?" Brennan asked rhetorically.
"So it was a case of go as hard as I can, as long as I can. I was really happy I could catch him but it was a really tough ask."
After turning pro this January, Brennan's chance of taking such an early success in his career is all the more remarkable given the starstudded lineup at Catalunya this year. Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) seemed keen to make a statement by taking up a leading position coming into the town where the Slovenian beat Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-Quick Step) on exactly the same finish back in 2023. But when push came to shove, it was Brennan who was in the perfect position to close down on Alpecin-Deceuninck's late attacker Tibor del Grosso and fend off del Grosso's teammate Kaden Groves for a stunning victory.
"A first WorldTour win, that's something I'll always remember," Brennan said. "It's quite a privilege to race amongst all these top names, and really nice to finish it off this way."
For Brennan, too, the Volta a Catalunya stage 1 triumph represents another gigantic step forward in his first year as a pro. Just days after his first win at the GP de Denain, he's now claimed both his first WorldTour victory and race lead - and finding his own place in Volta a Catalunya race history as a result.
At 19 years old and 230 days, Brennan is the Volta's third youngest-ever race leader, according to Procyclingstats. He is also the youngest since Catalunya's greatest rider, double Milan-San Remo winner Miguel Poblet, in 1947.
"It was good, we executed what we needed to do, and we're on top now," Brennan concluded. "So we'll see what happens in the next few days and go from there."
Tuesday's flat run to Figueras will likely end in a bunch sprint, but if there are crosswinds on the exposed finale, Brennan will be in his element as well. Another day in the lead, at the very least, seems possible, but in reality, anything after his stage 1 triumph is the icing on what is already a very large Catalunya-flavoured cake.
