A relatively flat race will always attract a field of sprinters. The course contains a few bumps, but nothing too hard. Riders like Romain Feillu, who has sprinted in Le Tour, Halvorsen, U23 World Champ and Barry Markus with WT experience and a podium in Scheldeprijs behind only Cavendish and Kittel, the field is absolutely stacked. Nevertheless, we feel that Robin is very suited to this kind of races on lower level. We'll try to make the race quite hard in order to try and get Robin in the best position possible. Nevertheless we don't expect much more than a top-10.

150 riders have lined up in Umag, where there's a nice spring weather today. Sunny with a few clouds should be to the liking of most riders.

Since teams could only bring 6 riders to this race, we decided that joining a break may have chances of success. Initially Andzs tried to get away but wasn't allowed to get away. The pace was very high in the first few kilometers. Eventually it dropped and Ruben tried to go in the break.

And this attempt was successful. He got in a group with some European riders: Kuen, Figueiredo, Errazkin and Sorm. We didn't know them very well and it was hard to estimate what kind of riders they were. That effect must have been a bit mutual.

Meanwhile in the pack the rest of the group decided to get settled a bit off the front now that the pace had dropped. Robin would get the protection he needed for a good performance today.

Ruben's group got a lead of over 5 minutes, but we never had the feeling it would be enough. All we could do was hoping that the sprinter teams burned their matches too early.

With the race progressing over the lap, we tried to estimate our planning. We found out that the little hill was a bit more challenging than expected, so as a back-up plan an attack there would be an option. Andzs is quite a good rider on the short climbs, and with his time trial skills he could ride the final bit to the line as well.

With 20km to go the lead of the break went under a minute. The hard work at the front became too much for Ruben, who had to let his fellow escapees go.

After the break was picked up, it was time for that final little climb. Andzs was unable to get to the front in time, but his pilot Taylor was. He therefore attacked.

But there was company. Romain Feillu and Kneisky managed to follow.

The attack may not have had much of a chance of success, but at least it caused one thing: chaos.

So while Taylor was almost being reeled in, we got ourselves organized in the chaos and set up a train for Robin, as can be seen in the far left in the pic above.

But the chaos didn't do us too well either.

Our train locomotive Miguel managed to hit the front with 5km to go, but forgot his carriage. Luckily Robin managed to settle for a good wheel.

The chaos was immense. Ty had found his way to the front as well, but Robin had been pushed back and seemed out of contention.

With no organization at all, Miguel started to just lead-out Ty near the front. Soon everyone around us started sprinting, and that's when we found Robin at the far left of the road.

We messed up our prep a bit today. We had three guys near the front so close to the line, but nothing that could give a top result.

Too far in front of us, Sanz took a narrow victory over Kankovsky with Averin coming third.

In the end, Ty took a decent 10th place, and Robin came 12th.

This feels like a race, where we could've gotten more despite an already decent result. Organizing ourselves turned out harder than expected, and maybe the guys are not yet used to racing in these areas. I'm sure the race on Rhodes will therefore bring more success.

This race could well turn out to be quite similar to the Trofej Umag. A sprint can be anticipated, because the hill in the route is quite far from the finish. Should someone make the pace there, it will suit Robin, but otherwise it's gonna be a tough exercise to sprint in this field, even though the field is a bit weaker than in Croatia.

At the start the weather was once again nice for a good day of racing, and Robin felt ready for a good race. In order to avoid having to chase, we tried joining the break again. There was not much fight to join, and so we got Brendan in the leading group with ease.

With him were Maltar, Hishinuma, Sufaj, Wendelspiess, Iafrati, Neuhauser and Prandini.

In the pack, we decided to just get settled in the middle. The rest of the team would have to wait long to get into action.

The race was not too interesting after the break had settled. Brendan's group managed to get a nearly 8 minutes lead, but the chase started soon. The only noteworthy events in the first 120 kilometers were a few crashes without any favorites involved. Could the large hill maybe bring some action?

Short answer: no. Long answer: still no. It seems like a normal mass sprint could be expected, or would some breakaway intervene?

With 20km to go and a 1m30 lead for Brendan's group, we decided it was time to get to the front in order to not get caught out. The door in the back of the pack was open.

With 8km to go, Brendan was caught along with Hishinuma. They were the last ones to be reeled in by the pack.

A bit to the back, a sprint train for Robin was already created, and seemed ready to storm to the front.

With a little under 5km to go, this plan came into action. Taylor took the lead and things were starting to look very good.

Next up was Andrei, who set up a strong pace.

This was highly disturbing the rest of the pack. The Kolss sprint train that was initally next to us, completely collapsed.

After a big effort the other sprinters eventually did catch up. Ty was now up to deliver a good lead-out.

Initially he did struggle to find pace, and so Buts and Kulyk passed.

Less than 1k to go and Buts still in the lead ahead of Ty. Robin was now coming though, but so were other sprinters like Papok.

And very surprisingly, Buts managed to hang on for the win!

The photo finish determined Shilov came 2nd, just ahead of Robin, who did pick up his first podium of the season.

A bit further back, both Ty and Andrei managed to pick up a top-10 as well, making this a successful result for us.

A very nice result for us here in the end. However, with the situation with 3km to go, we do have the feeling more was possible. We really did underestimate the technical finale and an earlier sprint by Robin might have given us the win. In any case we'll still take three riders in the top-10.