Gediminas Bagdonas (An Post-Sean Kelly) has underlined his growing reputation on the Continent by taking another significant victory in a UCI 1.2 ranked race in Belgium.
The 26-year-old Lithuanian took the Memorial Philippe Van Coningsloo yesterday, Sunday, as the bunch closed down on him.
A double stage winner and points classification winner in the An Post Ras the week before last, Bagdonas put some daylight between himself and the bunch in the closing stages and had plenty of time to celebrate as the mass sprint closed in just behind him.
It was Bagdonas’s second win in the race, having tasted victory in it in 2009. The An Post-Sean Kelly team also won the race last year with Andy Fenn, who has since gone on to secure a contract with Omega Pharma-Quickstep.
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Young Belgian rider Roy Jans, who is in his first year with the An Post-Sean Kelly team, was fifth yesterday.
The only other listed finisher from the Irish-Belgian team was Briton Mark McNally. He was part of the main bunch, just three seconds down after a small split in the peloton in the sprint.
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Ireland’s Philip Lavery was part of the NODE4-Giordana line-up in the race and came in just a few places behind McNally on the same time as him after a long race of 183kms; with just over four hours of action.
We’ve included a short video of the race above – the commentary is not in English but the images are very good quality so we thought you might like to watch it.
Memorial Philippe Van Coningsloo,
Overijse - Bonheiden 182.90km Belgium (1.2)
1 Gediminas BAGDONAS (An Post-Sean Kelly) 4:09:11
2 Benjamin VERRAES (Jong Vlaanderen – Bauknect)
3 Stan GODRIE (Rabobank-Giant)
4 Maxime LE MONTAGNER (Véranda Rideau-U)
5 Roy JANS (An Post-Sean Kelly)
6 Jef VAN MEIRHAEGHE (Lotto Ridley U23) @3secs
62 Mark MCNALLY (An Post-Sean Kelly) same time
71 Philip LAVERY (Node4-Giordana) same time
DNFs from the An Post-Sean Kelly team were Niels Wytinck, Joren Segers, Scott Law. There were 104 finishers.
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