The Japanese NC event is actually more like a Meiji-festival of cyling, with only two riders from JK Cycling trying to fight against 13 Meiji-riders..
The Meiji - Cannondale team got the permission to split it's squad into 4 groups with 3-4 riders each - and the riders promised it's fans to make it an interesting race.
Hatanaka as the clear favorite for the road race and Beppu for the timetrial.. get ready!
Meiji with two riders (Beppu, Nishitani) in the break of the day, with JK Cycling (Hayakawa) trying it's luck with the maybe only chance to grab the title.
Meiji might have promised it's fans a "real" race, but it ain't yet certain wether the bunch will do enough to reel the escapees back in:
55km to go, there's something like a chase by the remaining Meiji-groups and the gap ain't too huge with 5 minutes now..
It's a somehow expected strange race, as the gap went up to 6 minutes again (20km before finish).. but in the final lap, the pace is up and the gap is down:
the bunch managed to bridge this gap to the early escapees, who seem to suffer from the efforts here.. only 2km remaining and it looks like we will see a bunch sprint!
Yes, we will: Meiji all over the place for one of the most outstanding bunch sprints in the year 2013!
Doi (Meiji), Shimizu (Meiji) and Murakami (Meiji) lead the group into the steep final km..
But here goes top-favorite Hatanaka (Meiji), quickly opening up a gap with still a few hundred metres to go..
And that makes for an easy win: Yusuke Hatanaka is the crowned Japanese road champion 2013 and the spectators will love the way Meiji made this a quite entertaining race eventually.
JK Cycling Project chanceless, by the way: the Top-12 goes to Meiji only.
The favorite for the ITT will be Beppu (Meiji), with most probably Sano (Meiji) as the only real challenger on this flat 40km parcours..
Looking at the split, it's quite a surprise to see Beppu on 2nd place with only 1" behind Sano! Also Shimizu (Meiji) had a strong first half on the road to place himself just a few seconds behind Sano!
Will Sano hold on to this small gap? At least he keeps delivering in the second half and sets the new BT by gaining 17" on Shimizu eventually! Now it's up to favorite Beppu..
It remains a thrilling race and it's a very close decision: Beppu tried..
..but failed! He finishes with still the same 1" in arrears and so Junya Sano grabs a rather surprising (while not sensational) TT-victory!
Japanese NC event is actually more like a Meiji-festival of cyling, with only two riders from JK Cycling trying to fight against 13 Meiji-riders..
