After two years at Mitchelton Scott, Matteo Trentin begins a new adventure with the CCC team this season. He and Greg Van Avermaat will be transforming into a team in his second season with the team after moving from BMC.

Trentin is one of several new additions to the Polish team, competing in the Volta Ao Algarve for the third time in 2020 (second alongside Van Avermaat) and launching two attacks in the Spring Classic.

In Wednesday's opening stage in Lagos, he finished third behind Fabio Jacobsen (Detunink-Quickstep) and Elia Viviani (Cofidis).

"It was very good," said Jacobsen. They are a very good team. Of course, the result may not have been what we were looking for, but we have to look at the design of the stages: the Valenciana (where Trentin won a stage in 2019) was completely different from last year, and in Murcia we got a good result with Josef Cerny."

In Portugal, where two pure sprint stages and two tough hilltop finishes make up the bulk of the race, there is no menu that perfectly suits Trentin (Trentin said the fourth stage to Malhão could be for Van Avermaat ), so the CCC had to get creative in the finale of the first stage.

The men in orange were one of several teams that pushed the pace and attacked on an unclassified hill with 20 km to go. They were to wear down Viviani and Jacobsen and finish along the coast in Lagos.

"We decided to attack on the tricky part with 20km to go and shake things up a bit," Trentin said later. From there it was pretty hard racing until the last 10km. From there, it was a pretty hard race until the last 10km, when I was able to tire out the legs of the riders who were looking forward to the sprint."

Trentin entered the breakaway protected by his CCC teammates, but in the final dash he was surrounded behind Viviani and Jacobsen. Nevertheless, he was pleased with his effort.

"Third place is good," he said. It's a nice step up from the last two weeks."

Although it is one of the big races at an important early season time, the Volta Ao Algarve is not the major goal of the season for the stars who headed to the south of Portugal this week. Of course, the same is true for Trentin, with the spring classics and Grand Tour stages set as his main goals for 2020.

But for the Italian, the big goal is a simple one.

"Of course, my goal is to do the best I can and win. Winning is the biggest goal for me and for the team. Whether it's me or Greg, the main goal is winning."