Eddie Dunbar's evolution towards becoming a top tier WorldTour rider took a big step forward in Italy today when the young Irishman made the select group in Giro dell'Emilia and claimed 4th place.
The Team Ineos rider was in some very big company but proved one of the strongest up to the finish line atop the San Luca climb.
Dunbar, who appeared to be flying today
after his recent block of hard racing, put in a brilliant shift to make it into
a select group of just six riders on the final climb.
While he was the only Team Ineos rider in that group Deceuninck -QuickStep had two in the shape of João Almeida and Andrea Bagioli .
Astana also had two riders in the group,
namely 1st and 3rd at Saturday’s Il Lombardia, Jakob Fuglsang and Alexsandr Vlasov.
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UAE Team Emirates had one man in the group; one of the pre-race favourites in Diego Ulissi.
In the final couple of kilometres it was
Portugal’s rising star Almeida who looked like he was in the driving seat; the
22-year-old leading solo with about 30 seconds on the others.
However, Vlasov went after him on the
finish climb and while the Russian was trailed by Almeida’s team mate Bagioli,
he simply proved too strong as the road kept rising.
Vlasov first dropped Bagioli and then
hunted down the lone leader, catching him with 1km to go and instantly attacking
him to ride clear to a brilliant win.
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Almeida hung on for 2nd place 9 seconds
later as Bagioli was caught by the chasing trio of Ulissi, Dunbar and Fuglsang.
Eddie Dunbar looked extremely strong
right to the finish of the race, taking up the pace on the front of the
three-man group in a bid to try and catch Almeida.
After Dunbar did a hard turn and pulled
over inside the final kilometre Fuglsang pushed much harder but he couldn’t get
rid of the Irishman.
Instead, the Dane was distanced by
Dunbar and Ulissi and in the final push to the line it was the Italian cyclist
who got the better of the Irishman for the final place on the podium.
Ulissi finishing 18 seconds down on
Vlasov in 3rd place after 199.7km, with Dunbar in 4th at 21 seconds,
Bagioli in 5th at 24 seconds and Fuglsang in 6th place at 29 seconds.
However, while Dunbar missed out on a
podium placing, he was one of the strongest deep into the finale.
He showed the kind of form that suggests
he is firmly on track for a big few months ahead after the lock-down; taking
the best result of his career with a big win now looking increasingly likely
this season.
More to come.
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