Hah, yep! It was really great race for the team, we'll try to repeat that in MSR.

Once again, flat race in Belgium finishing in a Flanders city, but this time without cobbles. Let's hope that this sprint squad will bring us some luck, this time.




The race was without a break for a long time. After few unsucessful moves and tries to break away, Damuseau, Van Zandbeek and Paillot finally managed to create a breakaway and start co-operating. They're not really strong enough to win this from a far way out, so peloton lets them go.



As the race was comign to finish, weather was worse and worse. Race was basically one dimensional and quite dull almost all the time. From time to time there were few attacks in peloton, such as this one from Marcel Sieberg, 40 kilometers to go.



It was easy to guess that he'll be caught soon, just as breakaway. 32 kilometers to go and there is once again one big, compact group. Once again, few kilometers without anything interesting and once again - attack in peloton! It's Van Hecke this time.



But really, that was shortest attack ever. He was caught after only being 20 seconds in a lead. Now, guys are getting close to finish as there are only 10 kilometers to go. All of our guys are there.

Oss, Sieberg and Wynants tried some late wannabe Vinokourov attack, but that really didn't work out well.



The sprint started! Great positioning from NetApp guys, as Schorn leads out Bennett. Big mess back behind, as the roads are narrow and guys are being massively blocked. Danny van Poppel is one of them.



At the end, Bennett scores pretty easy win. Main sprintes manages to take on top and start real sprint really late, so they get positions from 3rd to 10th.



Solid race for us, as Van Poppel finishes as 4th, Silvestre as 5th and Alafaci as 6th.

1	Sam Bennett	Team NetApp - Endura	4h07'30
2	Daniel Oss	BMC Racing Team	s.t.
3	Gianni Meersman	Omega Pharma - Quick·Step	s.t.
4	Danny Van Poppel	Trek Factory Racing	s.t.
5	Fabio Silvestre	Trek Factory Racing	s.t.
6	Eugenio Alafaci	Trek Factory Racing	s.t.
7	Tom Veelers	Team Giant - Shimano	s.t.
8	Taylor Phinney	BMC Racing Team	s.t.
9	Marcel Sieberg	Lotto Belisol	s.t.
10	Kenny Van Hummel	Androni Giocattoli	s.t.

Yup, not really the result we expected with this squad, but shit happens...

Aaand, the day for Milano - San Remo , or La classicissima di Primavera as it is called on Italian, longest classic in ProTour calendar and first Spring Classic has come. Alot of riders are preparing for this for whole year. 300 kilometers of suffer, hills, descnets, flats and 300 kilometers of Italian roads and culture. 300 kilometers of hell are starting today!




Nothing can be really said about route. It's same as every year, basically route from Milano to San Remo city. The longest climb is Passo del Turchino which became basically trademark of this race. After that, long flat part comes before riders head to 3 last hills - Cipressa, Pompeiana and finally Poggio di San Remo, final hill where the race will be decided, most likely. Epic race.

Speaking of starlist, this race is surely one of most weird ones, as there is no defined "rule" for participating. Absolutely all kind of riders are taking participation here. Biggest favourites this year are Valverde, Gilbert, Cancellara, Chavanel, Kreuziger and Sagan.

But, everything can change if some of these guys doesn't make a move on Poggio or earlier and if that happens, sprinter will have chance to prove themselves. Nizzolo, Haussler, Boonen, Kristoff, Bozic, Farrar are some of most popular. All in all, it should be really, really interesting race to follow.



Our team is quite strong here and our leader is clearly Fabian Cancellara. All of the riders are endurance type of riders and I really think that we have great squad on this race. Nizzolo is there for potential final sprint and Frank Schleck is there for some early attack on some of last 3 hills.



We don't have any high expectations this, but we're sure Cancellara can do something big here. If not, Nizzolo will give his all to stay in main group and try something from sprint. It's win-win situation for us, it seems. That was all for this preview, see ya on the road.

DS of Trek FR - admirschleck

Thanks guys. We'll surely need alot of luck here!

Aaand, Classica Primavera is about to start! Most of the riders waited whole year for this and they're now in front of the longest race in world of cycling. Alot was said in preview, so nothing more can be really said now, except that we, as a team, wish luck to everyone.




After last years freezing hell with alot of rain and snow, the race comes back with great weather for cycling. The race will be more fair this time and hopefully good for us.

Anyways, after 30 kilometers of disagreements between peloton and break groups, one little group of cyclists managed to create a nice gap and BOTD. Bouhanni, Guarnieri, Leezer and Sanz there. They would make great sprinting squad, but this is MSR baby, no place for that.



As the peloton let them go, they gained some time quickly. Highest gap was on the half way between Passo del Turchino and Savona city, on the coast of Mediterranean sea. It was 9 minutes.



Anyways, back behidn in peloton, Trek controlled everything. As they didn't really feel good today, Rast and Voigt decided to be first 2 to relay pelotons top.



Most of favourites were enjoying the sunny day and great smell of Italian food on these beautiful coasts of Mediterranean sea, but certainly not all of them. Valverde had a crash in pretty bad moment for him, as peloton started upping the pace. It was about 70 kilometers to go. Luckily, Movistar reacted quickly and brought him back to the main group.



Riders were getting close to first serious challenge today called Cipressa climb. Just before its start, few guys decided to attack. Bardet, Gilbert, Westra and Slagter there.



That was, however, quickly caught thanks to Cannondale who were clearly working for Sagan. Riders started climbing on Cipressa and we decided to shake the legs of the riders in front a bit - Frank Schleck attacks!



It wasn't really serious attack and it got caught quickly. Riders finished that climb and no one managed to separate from peloton and get in break. But, in meantime, Gilbert made a move on the descent and is now going hard. Next climb is Pompeiana for him. He's looking good and he gets 30 seconds of advnatage over peloton!



The flat part between these 2 hills isn't long, so Gilbert had to face the Pompeiana soon. He's still in advantage and there's no one in front of him this time. Around 20 kilometers left.



Meanwhile, Sagan is upping the pace on the top of the peloton and now alot of the guys has problems to keep themselves in the group. Cancellara's still around, on some 5th-6th place in that group. He's feeling good.



Thanks to narrow roads and the weak guys that were just behind him, Peter Sagan made a little move from his seat and is now going all-in on the downhill.



He was able to see Gilbert all the time. That made a big psychological benefit to him. Cancellara is now our only guy that is around, in E3 group with rest of favourites. Nizzolo dropped on Pompeiana.



With the great performance on the flat part before Poggio, Sagan managed to catch the Gilbert. They're now 30 seconds in front 2nd group, where Cancellara is with Stybar, Boonen and few more favourites.



And, just few minutes after that, riders entered last 10 kilometers and faced the Poggio climb. Now, it's surely decisive moment. E1 group still has a lead, but it's decreasing. Cancellara is having his show from the seat down the road.



Machine were turned on and Cancellara could finally make his move. He easily connected the 2 groups, with few guys dropping behind. As the Poggio is short climb, the riders were on the top of it pretty soon.



The descent and flat part all to city of San Remo. Translated on cycling language - Fabian's terrain. Spartacus kept upping the pace all the time, which made some serious problems to other guys. 1 kilometer to go and he's first one to enter the last corner and start final kilometer.



Great positioning from Fabian made him first one to start the sprint. Stybar was right on his wheel. Sagan, Gilbert, Chavanel, Van Avermaet were all there. Can anyone overtake Fabian?



By each turn of the pedals, Fabian kept getting bigger and bigger advantage. Only 300 meters for him now, can he finally win this?



And yes! Guys behind, Sagan precisely, were too exhausted with early attack, while Fabian had a great strategy and just waited for this. What a great day for Trek, Switzerland and Cycling! Fabian Cancellara wins Milano San Remo 2014!



Stybar grabs the second, while Gilbert oversprints Sagan for third place. Great race, absolutely great race. Fabian could finally celebrate on the podium in San Remo, after few years of constantly finishing in first group, but not in first place.



This is also great indicator for the rest of spring-classics season. Let's hope Spartacus will continue this rhytm.

1	Fabian Cancellara	Trek Factory Racing	6h45'30
2	Zdenek Stybar	Omega Pharma - Quick·Step	+ 12
3	Philippe Gilbert	BMC Racing Team	+ 18
4	Peter Sagan	Cannondale	+ 21
5	Sylvain Chavanel	IAM Cycling	s.t.
6	Greg Van Avermaet	BMC Racing Team	+ 42
7	Maxim Iglinskiy	Astana Pro Team	s.t.
8	Roman Kreuziger	Tinkoff - Saxo	+ 43
9	Simon Spilak	Team Katusha	s.t.
10	Alejandro Valverde	Movistar Team	s.t.

Next morning, Fabian got alot of attention on local and even international newspappers. He surely deserved it!



Next step is Catalunya, where we'll be back with some more climbing action, again. See ya soon!

This race has Fabian written all over it

Fabian could finally celebrate on the podium in San Remo, after few years of constantly finishing in first group, but not in first group.

Indeed, surely the best win in the story so far. Fabian once again showed that he has great strategy. Definitely deserved win. We hope he can continue this rhytm and get even better form and win RvV and PR.

Thanks for correction Cossack, it's edited.

And, the action doesn't stop after MSR! Actually, it just starts there. Day after the longest stage in WT calendar, guys have to face another challenge - 7 days long Vuelta a Catalunya, 4th UWT race this season.




As you can see, route is very climby and mountainous, which will surely bring us alot of interesting situations and attacks. No hilly stages, which is really interesting, 4 mountain and 3 flat stages. Should be great race to ride and follow!

Starlist is really strong here. As most of the climbers and stage-races misses this part of season (spring classics), good part of them decides to take part in this race. Therefore, we do have Porte, Rodriguez, Quintana, Mollema, 2013 winner Dan Martin, Costa, Contador and few more. Really nice competition, if you ask me.



And finally, talking about our team, we definitely brought our strongest squad (without Frank and Didier, but well...) here, with Kiserlovski, Schleck, Arredondo, Zubeldia, Busche and Zoidl. It's quite sad to see that our guys aren't, after so many years, even in list of outsiders. But , it's the reason why I am here, to rebuild and raise the team of Trek to the top place, once again.



We also do have Australian youngster, Calvin Watson who'll be there mostly for bringing water bottles and Boy van Poppel who'll be our first sprinter in this race. So, this was all for the preview, see ya on the road.

DS of Trek FR - admirschleck