Baden Cooke (Française des Jeux) won the opening stage of a glitch-marred Tour of Poland on Monday.

The Aussie won a bunch sprint at the end of the 149km stage from Gdansk to Elblag, outkicking Luca Paolini (Quick Step) and Francesco Chicchi (Fassa Bortolo) after more than three hours of racing.

The Polish tour, making its debut as part of the UCI ProTour, got off to a dubious start when Alexandre Vinokourov (T-Mobile) - who was only 48 points behind Pro Tour series leader Danilo Di Luca of Italy (Liquigas-Bianchi) in the individual rankings - was one of four riders from Kazakhstan who did not receive their visas in time to start the race.

T-Mobile replaced Vinokourov with Czech rider Tomas Konecny, who has missed most of the 2005 season through injury.

Vino's countrymen Andrey Kashechkin and Dimitriy Muravyev (Crédit Agricole) and Dimitri Fofonov (Cofidis) also did not travel, Tour of Poland press officer Marcin Karda told AFP.

Then the race got off to a late start after two teams arrived late in Gdansk. Illes Balears and Euskatel, "were delayed by bad weather" when leaving San Sebastian in Spain, Karda told AFP.

Results
1. Baden Cooke (Aus), Française des Jeux), 149km in 3:21:23
2. Luca Paolini (I), Quick Step, same time
3. Francesco Chicchi (I), Fassa Bortolo, s.t.
4. Luciano Pagliarini (Bra), Liquigas-Bianchi, s.t.
5. Laurent Brochard (F), Bouygues Telecom, s.t.

Overall
1. Baden Cooke (Aus), Française des Jeux), 3:01:13
2. Luca Paolini (I), Quick Step, at 0:04
3. Francesco Chicchi (I), Fassa Bortolo, at 0:06
4. Freddy Bichot (F), Française des Jeux, at 0:07
5. Davide Bramati (I), Quick Step, same time