Slovenia hosts this circuit base hilly classic which involves 7 tough initial 17km circuits, before easing down to 3 easier 10km circuits.
The nature of this classic is that it will be tactical and breakaways have seen plenty of success throughout the season on this type of terrain. Several riders are up the road by the time we are on the second of the seven initial circuits.
However this proves to be a bit of a false dawn and in truth none of these riders looked entirely comfortable on the steep climb. These riders are caught and a slightly more able group of nine slips clear in the 3rd of 7 initial circuits.
Idan Shapira was probably one of the better riders from the initial move and he is here again along with Loic Desirac Steve Zampieri Bart Veyt Marco Brus Ronald Gonzalez Joost Van Leijen Eddy Van IJzendoorn Zdenek Krizek
and Ahmed Albourdainy
chases on too.
This group of now ten riders are allowed some freedom pulling out a decent two and a half minute gap by the time we get onto the 5th of 7 circuits. With 80km to go we are within range of the often successful mid stage attack, if a group can get up to the leaders at this points this can put pressure on the pack.
Indeed recent Picardie winner Maxim Burlutsky takes this gamble along with Tim Vermeersch and Matic Strgar
Het Nieuwsblad and Skoda decide to mark this move with Rodolfo Fernandez and Stanislav Kozùbek.
These five chasers very quickly chase onto the break to make 15 riders and with 70km to go their lead is up to a dangerous 4.30.
Het Nieuwsblad have announced that they really fancy doing well in these races and despite having Fernandez up the road they chase with Metinvest (who have Shapira up the road) and AMEX (who have Veyt).
This chasing does start to bring things down, though with 30km left the gap is still a tricky 3.12 and these three teams start to ease off at the front. AMEX are sort of reluctant to chase their own teammate down although admittedly Veyt looks like he is struggling to hang on a bit. As they stop pacing of course teams with punchaers launch desperate attacks.
A notable missing name is Benoît Daeninck who has crashed and is out of contention.
Of course no surprise to see P Lasko all over this race, with it being a Slovenian sponser. Metinvest's Grychenko though is the rider who seems most desperate to join his two teammates in the 15 man break up the road.
He attacks through the bell signifying 10km to go but closing down this 2 minutes is going to be a mammoth ask. However he keeps attacking for the next 3km!
He stretches it out but other riders just cannot help Grychenko with the pace, though as they go up the last hilly section the gap looks closable.
However Vermeersch keeps the pace high in the break as others look to hang back a bit for teammates.
His pace is high enough to keep the gap at over a minute and Grychenko sinks back in his saddle realising another hilly classic has slipped from his grasp. Though at least here he has two teammates up the road, who both are in the first six places as we are going into the sprint.
Zdenek Krizek and Steve Zampieri are well placed on Vermeersch's wheel also. However the two Metinvest's and the Skoda and Adecco riders are no match for Vermeersch who finds another gear.
Maxim Burlutsky is left to close the gap. Knowing how capable Burlutskiy is in a sprint Slovenian Matic Strgar sticks to his wheel with Stanislav Kozùbek
As they close on the kite Vermeersch is beginning to rock and roll on his bike drifting to the centre, whilst Burlutskiy keeps his wheel firmly on the barriers.
Eddy Van IJzendoorn, Ronald Gonzalez, and Rodolfo Fernandez are in the frame here and all three have decent kicks if the hills have not knocked the speed off of them.
Burlutskiy leaves the barrier open understandably as they come to a left hand turn, sensing a move behind from Van IJzendoorn. Strgar is moving up outside Burlutsky with Kozubek sticking close to Strgar as possible.
As we pan out it is pretty clear that the winner will come from Strgar, Burlutskiy, Kozubek, Van IJzendoorn, Gonzalez, Fernandez, Vermeesch, Desirac and Brus. The other riders clearly struggling from a long day in the break.
Versmeesch predictable fades away as does now Burlutskiy who reeled in the Delhaize man a bit too quick. Van IJzendoorn has to check his sprint a go round the Armavia rider leaving Strgar and Kozubek to sprint through into 1st and 2nd.
Kozubek has nothing extra to come around Strgar and we get a home winner of GP Kranj. Pivivorna Lasko really looked keen to do something here and they have produced a fine win.
Kozubek finishes second for the threatened Skoda team, you cannot fault their riders they got two men in the key move here. Van IJzendoorn overtakes Burlutskiy for third which gives Kingspan a much needed boost before the mountainous stuff, like wise for Petrobrus who grab 5th. Het Nieuwsblad get 6th and just miss adding to their classics conistency goal. Deseric is just edged out by Brus for 7th.
Van Leijen overtook Vermeersch for 9th and Veyt ends up in 11th ahead of both Metinvests who come 12th and 15th, Zampieri and Kirzek rounding out our top 15. Ospina leads the chase group behind ahead of Petrov, Pacheco, Lobato, Tang, Ciccerese, Arekejev, Danculovic, Grychenko, Herve and Ven der Schueren.
The best punchaers just missed out once again with those taking a gamble on the break proving successful. Still this was a nice win for the Slovenian team!
