After the National Championships, some of our riders competed at the World Championships. Not only we represented a majority of the Slovenian delegation, but riders of ours also were member of several other squads.
Championships were held on the hilly roads in Japan, in and around Nagasaki. Let's see how our riders performed at U23 and Elite level in both RR and ITT as well as TTT.
B World Championships
On the tough circuit the race was ridden with some rough pace. Victorious was Moldovan superstar Alex Pluchkin, while our man Navardauskas supported his teammate Siskevicius for achieving the silver medal. Our best rider was Xavier Quevedo in 44th.
1
Aleksandr Pluchkin
Moldova
7h47'27
2
Evaldas Siskevicius
Lithuania
+ 1'40
3
Christopher Juul-Jensen
Denmark
s.t.
4
Nicolas Roche
Ireland
s.t.
5
Yonathan Monsalve
Venezuela
s.t.
6
David Boily
Canada
s.t.
7
Gregory Brenes
Costa Rica
s.t.
8
Kristian Haugaard Jensen
Denmark
s.t.
9
Rein Taaramäe
Estonia
s.t.
10
Arvin Moazemi
Iran
+ 3'21
44
Xavier Quevedo
Venezuela
+ 6'43
47
Stanislau Bazhkou
Belarus
+ 7'55
54
Martin Laas
Estonia
+ 8'18
63
Matthias Brändle
Austria
s.t.
117
Ramunas Navardauskas
Lithuania
+ 12'27
TTT World Championship
Of course we were rooting for the Slovenian team, built up with:
Simon Spilak
Slovenia
Janez Brajkovic
Slovenia
Matej Mugerli
Slovenia
Jan Polanc
Slovenia
Mark Dzamastagic
Slovenia
Jaka Bostner
Slovenia
Marko Kump
Slovenia
Luka Pibernik
Slovenia
The team showed a strong outing, being close to the top on the intermediate times. At the end they sadly got dropped a little, hence loosing out by some margin.
Portugal won the day.
1
Portugal
1h06'07
2
USA
+ 5
3
Colombia
+ 13
4
Spain
+ 30
5
Czech Republic
+ 35
6
Slovenia
+ 48
U23 ITT World Championship
Gasper Katrasnik put up the level early for our squad, bringing up a new best time.
Meanwhile Borisavljevic and Herklotz were beating the time set by Katrasnik.
David Per looked like Herklotz biggest threat as he was 3 seconds faster in the first intermediate point and after the second he was only 5 seconds behind. But if there’s someone meant to take the Gold Medal away from Herklotz, it’s not going to be the young Slovenian, as he fell short by just 2 seconds!!
1
Silvio Herklotz
Germany
1h16'21
2
David Per
Slovenia
+ 2
3
Ryan Mullen
Ireland
+ 9
4
Goran Antonijevic
Serbia
+ 20
5
Mads Würtz
Denmark
+ 22
9
Gasper Katrasnik
Slovenia
+ 39
U23 RR World Championship
Only 3 laps left (60 kms) and the group has been reduced to just 120 riders, and between them, is not anymore 2016 U23 WC, Kasperkiewicz, who must have had a bad day, as he’s dropped together with Per, who might be suffering from his earlier crash
Top favourite Herklotz was the first to fire, but Mohoric, together with Kudus, was able to cover that move.
The second punch was too much for him though, he could not sustain his power and had to settle for third. Still another medal for us!
1
Silvio Herklotz
Germany
7h59'55
2
Merhawi Kudus
Eritrea
+ 32
3
Matej Mohoric
Slovenia
+ 1'09
17
Xhuliano Kamberaj
Europe
+ 3'05
21
Miha Poljanec
Slovenia
s.t.
39
Tadej Logar
Slovenia
+ 4'40
41
Jernej Svab
Slovenia
s.t.
89
Romeo Quicibal
America
+ 12'31
107
Gasper Katrasnik
Slovenia
+ 13'54
151
David Per
Slovenia
+ 20'52
ITT World Championship
The first to start is Slovenian Janez Brajkovic. His time is 1h15’24, a time which would have already beaten Herklotz’s time in the U23 race.
Not the greatest of days for Brändle, and he just gets into the Top20, being more than 2 minutes slower than Gesink.
1
Robert Gesink
Netherlands
1h13'30
2
Taylor Phinney
Usa
+ 33
3
Rein Taaramae
Estonia
+ 41
4
Simon Spilak
Slovenia
+ 42
5
Marcel Kittel
Germany
+ 43
21
Janez Brajkovic
Slovenia
+ 1'54
31
Matthias Brandle
Austria
+ 2'20
RR World Championship
Despite an early crash of Kump, our Slovenian squad took control of the race for Simon Spilak.
But the Slovenian couldn't execute. Ponzi was the first to fire and has never been seen again. Second and third went to Bakelants and Sagan, while Spilak had a disappointing finish in 11th.
1
Simone Ponzi
Italy
7h31'00
2
Jan Bakelants
Belgium
+ 31
3
Peter Sagan
Slovakia
s.t.
4
Yuri Trofimov
Russia
s.t.
5
Tejay Van Garderen
USA
s.t.
11
Simon Spilak
Slovenia
s.t.
47
Matej Mugerli
Slovenia
+ 3'53
66
Jan Polanc
Slovenia
+ 5'10
74
Janez Brajkovic
Slovenia
s.t.
88
Marko Kump
Slovenia
+ 8'36
89
Jaka Bostner
Slovenia
s.t.
127
Luka Pibernik
Slovenia
+ 13'48
With medals for Mohoric and Per in the U23 races, 2 riders that play a major role in our future plans, we can be very happy with the outcome of the 2017 world championships!
Closing the Isostar - Adriatic headquarters for 2017 The final chapter
We've had turbulences: Ups and downs, tears of the fallen and tears of joy. But we all had a lot of action. And this time, the story had a happy end. We promoted to the Pro Tour, against all odds.
What we are going to do now is for one last time checking the path we had to walk to achieve this glory. Let's look back at our calendar for 2018, and see where we scored the points that led us to promotion:
The standout result of course was the 5 Jours du Dunquerque, where we had our breakout result with the likes of Kump, Jans and Polanc scoring all over the place, stamping a fat lime green Isostar stamp on the race.
Further races of over 200 points have been our brilliant win at La Tropicale Amissa Bongo, where Kump upset the opponence on the flat and bumpy stages. We've had 3 more 200+ points outings, all in hilly TT tours. That has been some remarkable work by our squad around Brändle in the scandinavian races Tour of Norway and Post Danmark Rundt, as well as the clashing Tour of Slovenia, where we had our win goal and delivered big time, especially with Stan earning his money here giving us a 2nd overall on home soil.
The best classics rund has taken place at Lincoln GP (160) and Philly International (140), where Kump and Polanc secured big time wins for our squad. Over 110 points were also achieved at the Tour of Austria, where Brajkovic led us to some nice points, and the Corsica International with similar ambitions. On top, Kump smashed it at the Tour Down Under to really start the season for us with 192 points.
Only 1 race saw us really failing: The very first race of the season, Down Under Classic, left us with a fat 0. Remarkably, the Classique du Grand-Duche would've given us almost 200 points if we were allowed to score points there. Also the team had some great outings at the U23 races, where we couldn't get to the absolute top however.
All in all we had a fantastic season, where especially our depth in the Kump supporting cast and on the difficult TT stage races has made us score big points to lead us to promotion.
Now for one last time let us take a look at our full Palmares for 2017, seeing all the achievements we unlocked with our fantastic squad:
We could not be any prouder on both our total of notable results and the variety of riders that led us to achieve those. And we must not forget the number of Slovenian results we were able to create throughout the season. To say it in our HQ race reports style:
Positive Surprise:Isostar - Adriatic - You can not be prouder than the team management about the dedication the team has shown throughout the season. We couldn't have imagined the season any better. Thanks to all involved for this remarkable season!
Negative Surprise:-
For those of you that want to re-follow our path in 2017, here we'll provide our full list of episodes this year. See you in 2018!
What an absolutely stunning way to wrap up an absolutely stunning season. Classy, smart and all-around amazing achievement and richly deserved. The HQ always top notch to boot, and I can't wait to see how the men in lime fare in PT 2018
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [PT] Xero Racing
Down Under Classic
Tour de Pologne
Gent - Wevelgem
Viana do Castelo
Classique du Grand-Duché
Strade Bianche
Tour of Almaty
La Tropicale Amissa Bongo
GP Herning
Qatar Oil Mountain Classic
Vuelta al Pais Vasco
Tour de Romandie
Tour of South Africa
GP Liechtenstein
Philadelphia Int. Classic
Berlin Pro Race
Tour of Norway
Lincoln GP
Lac Megantic Classic
Tour de Slovénie
Monterrey TTT
Kenya Mountain Classic
Int. Österreich Rundfahrt
Clásica San Sebastian
Tour of Ukraine
Vuelta a Colombia
Barbados Cycling Classic
Tour of East Java
GP Kigali
Japan Cup
