Marko Polanc: This is our final mountain race of the season and we've brought our strongest climbers to support Jose Alarcon. We don't have a sprinter so we would like to go in breakaways on the flat stages at least.


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Goal	Outcome	Rider
Stage win	Success	Andrea Zordan	1st (stage 4)
Stage win	Failure	Andrea Zordan	3rd (stage 18)
Stage win	Failure	Lahcen Saber	4th (stages 7, 8)
Points win	Failure	Lahcen Saber	10th

Race score: 2/10

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Gorazd Stangelj: This is Eddy's penultimate race of the year and the final dress rehearsal for the Giro dell'Emilia. We know we are up against PT competition, but we feel we have a strong team and we will target a top 10 place.


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Goal	Outcome	Rider
Breakaway appearance	Success	Andres Camilo Ardila

Race score: N/A

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Goal	Outcome	Rider	Result
Top 15	Failure	Miha Poljanec	24th

Race score: 3/10

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Team Cedevita arrived in Milano in a calm, relaxed state, but also confident in team leader Eduard Beltran after his exploits in Balkans International. There was a big breakaway of 20 riders so Cedevita helped out with the chasing duties. A strong breakaway meant a strong pace in the peloton. With 17 km to go the breakaway was long caught and the main group consisted of only 36 riders. David Gaudu was setting the tempo in the last 10 km for Cedevita. The Frenchman couldn't do anymore to follow an attack from Hagen. Beltran picked up the chasing and did way too much work. He caught Hagen in the last km, but had nothing left to compete for victory. He did still manage a great 3rd place though and Gaudu did well to finish 17th.

Goal	Outcome	Rider	Result
Top 5	Success	Eduard Alexander Beltran	3rd
Top 20	Success	David Gaudu	17th

Race score: 8/10

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Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	1		Aker - MOT	3583	159	22,53	3943
2	3		Los Pollos Hermanos	3192	167	19,11	3344
3	5		Polar	3126	157	19,91	3484
4	4		cycleYorkshire	3118	171	18,23	3190
5	8		Duolingo	3107	159	19,54	3420
6	2		Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff	3046	173	17,61	3082
7	11		Team UBS	2842	159	17,87	3127
8	6		Bralirwa - Stevens	2826	159	17,77	3110
9	10		Cedevita	2800	163	17,18	3007
10	7		Binance Cycling	2756	171	16,12	2821
11	17		Kraftwerk Man Machine	2720	165	16,48	2884
12	13		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	2588	163	15,88	2779
13	14		Project: Africa	2533	171	14,81	2592
14	15		Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam	2532	173	14,64	2562
15	9		Red Bull Zalgiris	2442	167	14,62	2559
16	12		Assa Abloy	2298	163	14,1	2468
17	16		Minions	2100	165	12,73	2228
18	19		Jura - Fiat	1950	163	11,96	2093
19	18		Sauber Petronas Racing	1945	169	11,51	2014
20	24		Indosat Ooredoo	1923	167	11,51	2014
21	20		Philips - Force India	1853	163	11,37	1990
22	25		Carrefour - ESPN	1845	165	11,18	1957
23	21		Podium Ambition	1792	169	10,6	1855
24	22		Voyagin - Bird	1787	167	10,7	1873
25	23		Tryg - Ritter Sport	1659	169	9,82	1719
26	26		Eurosport x GCN	1426	173	8,24	1442

Update #6 spans over the entire month of September, a busy racing month for Cedevita. It was an up and down month which eventually led us to move up a spot to 9th. Here is how it went.

We kicked off the month in the PTHC classic Paris Tours. We were hoping to finally nail a late attack in a sprint classic, but the sprint teams didn't allow that and Gasper Katrasnik only managed a 19th place. We then travelled for the long awaited Tour of America, which turned into an unmitigated disaster. Sure Andrea Zordan won a stage, spent a few days in the KOM jersey and Abolfazl Gilanipoor finished a respectable 14th overall. But without any meaningless scoring from Lahcen Saber in the sprints it became a very frustrating race. Luckily that was offset by performing fantastically in our home race in the Balkans. Eddy Beltran scored a stage win along with finishing 2nd overall, his best performance at the race by far!

After Balkans a large part of our young climbers went to compete at Euskal Bizikleta where they did their best to overcome a below par performance by Matej Vysna. Santiago Buitrago even won the U25 classification! We then finished the month with 3 one day races. We sent our competitive squad to the Dutch part of the cobbled clash where Miha Poljanec finished 24th. The hills squad went to Italy where Beltran led us for the Milano-Torino classic. He didn't quite win it like in 2019, but finished in a very good 3rd place.

Our place in the rankings looks to have pretty much safeguarded our sponsor goal of finishing in the top 15. And while we're touted by some as promotion outsiders, we go into our last few races with no pressure. Let's enjoy the rest of this fun and successful season.

Eduard Alexander Beltran	Cedevita	1116
Jose Alarcon	Cedevita	375
Lahcen Saber	Cedevita	326
David Gaudu	Cedevita	213
Tadej Pogacar	Cedevita	182
Abolfazl Gilanipoor	Cedevita	102
Izidor Penko	Cedevita	99
Andrea Zordan	Cedevita	96
Dusan Rajovic	Cedevita	54
Miha Poljanec	Cedevita	38
Havard Blikra	Cedevita	31
Gasper Katrasnik	Cedevita	29
Matej Vysna	Cedevita	26
Andres Camilo Ardila	Cedevita	20
Michael Christodoulos	Cedevita	19
Ivan Siric	Cedevita	19
Santiago Buitrago	Cedevita	11
Matija Mestric	Cedevita	10
Olivier Le Gac	Cedevita	10
Matic Groselj	Cedevita	9
Jefferson Cepeda Hernandez	Cedevita	5
Juan Pedro Lopez	Cedevita	4
Goran Antonijevic	Cedevita	2
Alexander Evans	Cedevita	2
Kristjan Hocevar	Cedevita	2

Bostjan Mervar,
team representative and general manager of Cedevita

Cedevita visited Japan for the 2nd time this season. This time for the one day hilly race. No representation in the breakaway as the team opted to keep their powder dry for the latter parts of the race. The first attacks from the favourites came on the penultimate lap. Team leader Eddy Beltran was following the moves, but it was clear his positioning wasn't great near the end of the group. The answer came on the last lap when the Colombian couldn't follow anymore. He finished the race 10th, first behind the leading group. And while he didn't have a great time, Cedevita got some surprising results behind him with loanee Cepeda Hernandez 14th and David Gaudu in 19th place.

Goal	Outcome	Rider	Result
Top 10	Success	Eduard Alexander Beltran	10th
Top 25	Success	Jefferson Cepeda Hernandez	14th
Top 25	Success	David Gaudu	19th

Race score: 8/10

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Gorazd Stangelj: Our final race and final sponsor goal of the season. While we would love to win it, we know that's going to be very difficult. Still we are up to the challenge and will try to finish out the season as high as possible.


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Without a sprinter in the squad, Cedevita kept quiet on stage 1. Stage 2 was the first hilly stage and Jose Alarcon did well to finish in the group behind the winner. Stage 3 was the queen stage. Alarcon was well up for showing his climbing prowess, following all the attack until Godoy distanced him on the final uphill. He finished the stage 2nd, a fantastic result!

Stages 4 and 5 went to the sprinters with no Cedevita involvement. Stage 6 was the 2nd mountain stage. Alarcon didn't quite have the same legs and dropped from 3rd to 5th in GC. Stage 7 was another important GC stage. Alarcon was looking okay on the final slopes with 20 km to go, but an ill timed puncture meant he lost his position and lost too much time, eventually dropping down to 9th overall. The final stage was animated by Goran Antonijevic going in the breakaway and holding out for quite a while before the sprinters got their way. He finished the stage in 11th place. All in all a good race from Cedevita with a bit of bitter aftertaste in the end.

Goal	Outcome	Rider	Result
Top 10 GC	Success	Jose Alarcon	9th

Race score: 7/10

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Goal	Outcome	Rider	Result
Top 5	Failure	Eduard Alexander Beltran	12th
Top 20	Success	Olivier Le Gac	17th
Top 20	Success	Andrea Zordan	18th
Top 20	Success	David Gaudu	20th

Race score: 3/10

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Here we are. The season is over so let's see how we did?

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD
1	1		Aker - MOT	3755	175	21,46
2	3		Polar	3331	175	19,03
3	5		Duolingo	3323	175	18,99
4	2		Los Pollos Hermanos	3258	175	18,62
5	4		cycleYorkshire	3250	175	18,57
6	7		Team UBS	3119	175	17,82
7	6		Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff	3053	175	17,45
8	9		Cedevita	3036	175	17,35
9	11		Kraftwerk Man Machine	2917	175	16,67
10	8		Bralirwa - Stevens	2871	175	16,41
11	10		Binance Cycling	2801	175	16,01
12	12		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	2744	175	15,68
13	15		Red Bull Zalgiris	2625	175	15
14	14		Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam	2607	175	14,9
15	13		Project: Africa	2589	175	14,79
16	16		Assa Abloy	2431	175	13,89
17	17		Minions	2319	175	13,25
18	24		Voyagin - Bird	2144	175	11,45
19	21		Philips - Force India	2131	175	11,62
20	20		Indosat Ooredoo	2112	175	12,04
21	19		Sauber Petronas Racing	2030	175	11,17
22	22		Carrefour - ESPN	2006	175	11,4
23	18		Jura - Fiat	2003	175	11,42
24	23		Podium Ambition	1800	175	10,29
25	25		Tryg - Ritter Sport	1736	175	9,92
26	26		Eurosport x GCN	1438	175	8,22

We had our best season in PCT to date, which means our best season in MG. We finished in 8th place, breaking the mark of 3000 points. In a season where we were expected to be in the bottom half of the table or even fight against relegation we ended up surpassing all expectations.

A quick recap to how we ended the month with three races in October. Our 2nd trip to Japan for the hilly Japan Cup classic was a good one. While Eddy Beltran wasn't at his very best in 10th, we scored some nice depth points from young loanee Cepeda Hernandez and the always dependable David Gaudu. At the same time another group competed in Maroc where Jose Alarcon finished a credible 9th overall. The last race of the season and final sponsor goal was at Giro dell'Emilia. While we were hoping Eddy was working towards peaking for one last race it became clear that the long season took a toll on him. We spectacularly missed out on our final goal and any outside chance at promotion.

Still, there is so much to be happy about. Eddy Beltran did something amazing such as winning the individual scoring crown as the best rider in PCT! A terrific achievement that underscores Eddy's value to our team and how we remain committed to supporting him.
There are other riders worthy of a mention here. Jose Alarcon came from free agency to lead our climbing efforts and definitely provided a presence in some mountain races. David Gaudu was the only buy we could afford on the transfer market and he formed a great duo with Eddy, as well as taking his own chance here or there. Finally, Tadej Pogacar. After two years on loan we finally got him in our jersey and he didn't disappoint us. He was a great domestique while also scoring plenty of points in the U25 classification.

We will recap all the riders performance later in the off season.

1	Eduard Alexander Beltran	Cedevita	1171
37	Jose Alarcon	Cedevita	469
66	Lahcen Saber	Cedevita	326
96	David Gaudu	Cedevita	232
107	Tadej Pogacar	Cedevita	185
168	Abolfazl Gilanipoor	Cedevita	110
171	Andrea Zordan	Cedevita	106
178	Izidor Penko	Cedevita	99
258	Dusan Rajovic	Cedevita	54
303	Miha Poljanec	Cedevita	38
305	Havard Blikra	Cedevita	38
330	Matej Vysna	Cedevita	33
344	Gasper Katrasnik	Cedevita	29
356	Jefferson Cepeda Hernandez	Cedevita	27
383	Andres Camilo Ardila	Cedevita	20
391	Michael Christodoulos	Cedevita	19
392	Ivan Siric	Cedevita	19
398	Olivier Le Gac	Cedevita	19
437	Santiago Buitrago	Cedevita	11
442	Matija Mestric	Cedevita	10
450	Matic Groselj	Cedevita	9
482	Juan Pedro Lopez	Cedevita	6
520	Goran Antonijevic	Cedevita	2
527	Alexander Evans	Cedevita	2
530	Kristjan Hocevar	Cedevita	2

We will have further posts about the season and future developments in the coming days. Stay tuned.

Bostjan Mervar,
team representative and general manager of Cedevita

Congrats for your season! Future of the team looks bright with Pogacar, as he showed in Avenir

Pogi so close to the top-100 already as a lvl 3 rider, amazing. He's proven to be an amazing rider in Avenir, and I'm looking forward to his programme next year. Would be lovely to see him in a GT, if you'd go for one. The main man for now of course EAB (with his reliable domestique Gaudu), what a season from the Colombian, soon going for the third NC title in a row After some relegation struggles last year you now came very close to promoting, so maybe next year's the year?

Had forgotten that Pog is almost a bigger cheat in MG than IRL
I guess even just bringing him to lvl4 makes you a promotion candidate next year - if EAB can keep up the pace and doesn't continue his yo-yo.
Great job this year, given that even just a better Emelia performance could have brought you very close to the (potential) promotion spots!

Thanks
The future might be bright, but it's still far away as far as I'm concerned. Gotta keep moving in the right direction in order to reach it.


His programme for next season is a problematic thing. Hopefully I don't have to 'waste' too many of his RDs for xp sake. Also at the same time, he might outgrow his stats of a breakaway rider which should limit a chunk of his scoring from this season.


Kinda sad he has only one maxed season left. Being the 'main man' is an understatement to what he has meant to this team since promotion from CT.
Hopefully I have some promising youngsters that can fill his big shoes.


I don't think so. The fact we finished where we did is a complete surprise with some lucky results that placed us higher than where we realistically belong. Keeping the status quo would be a realistic goal.


Not nearly as big as IRL But if you help me convince the 'big wigs' that most of his stats get upped by 3-5 then we can start talking


You forgot that a bunch of other riders need to get the same results again and that I have riders also declining
Thanks for the kind words Our great results had to run out at some point even if it did happen in the last race.

Bostjan Mervar,
team representative and general manager of Cedevita

Although it's never ideal to not succeed at your most important goal, it's definitely great to see 4/5 successes. Something tells me that Eddy could have almost exactly the same goals next season

If he could have the same goals, then yes. But that likely won't be possible.

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