Enrico Gasparetto took the race leader's pink jersey on Saturday's opening stage of the Giro d'Italia as he led his team-mates home to victory in the team time-trial.
Gasparetto, 25, may have taken the honours on the day but it is his team-mate Danilo Di Luca who fired the first real salvo of this year's race.
Di Luca may have been denied the pink jersey by his team-mate's burst of speed, but he sent a clear message to his pretenders for overall victory with his and his team's performance in the 25.6km stage from Caprera to La Maddalena in Sardinia.
The Astana team, led by two-time Giro winner Paolo Savoldelli was 16 seconds off the pace in second while the podium was completed by Denmark's CSC outfit, whose candidate for overall honours is Fabian Cancellara of Switzerland.
Di Luca, from the central Italian region of Abruzzo, appeared to be calling to Gasparetto to let him overtake him in the closing metres but he played down any notion of a team row after the finish.
Di Luca said: 'I will take the pink jersey later in the race and what's important is that the team won. I shouted at Gasparetto to slow down but I could not stop my team-mate. But I am still happy.'
Other likely contenders for honours, including Italians Gilberto Simoni and Stefano Garzelli and Ukraine's Yaroslav Popovych, already have ground to make up on Di Luca.
On Sunday the second stage of the three-week long race will see the peloton stay in Sardinia for a 203km run from Tempio Pausania to Bosa.
The race arrives on the Mainland on Wednesday and will visit France and Austria before the usual finishing point in Milan on June 3.
This year's 90th edition of a race second in prestige only to the Tour de France has been overshadowed by doping scandals that have led to the withdrawal from competition of several high-profile riders, including 2006 winner Ivan Basso who recently parted company with the Discovery outfit.
