NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS: Visma | Lease a Bike suffer defeat in Hungary, Astana dominate in Kazakhstan and Rein Taaramae defends Estonian title

Visma | Lease a Bike suffer a defeat in Hungary, Astana Qazaqstan dominate home Nationals and Rein Taaramäe narrowly defends his time trial title in Estonia. Let's review a few more events of the first days of this year's National Championships block.

Hungary

Starting off with the Hungarian Championships, there was only one big favourite and that was Visma | Lease a Bike's Attila Valter - champion in 2023 (and 2019). On the start were another two two-time champions in Polti Kometa's Erik Fetter (2022 and 2021) and Adria Mobil's Barnabás Peák (2020, 2018), in the past pro with CCC, Intermarché and Human Powered Health. Those who expected another masterclass by Valter after last year's victory with nearly two-minute lead couldn't have been more mistaken as it was the 25-year-old Peák to claim the throne by 10 seconds over the 38 kilometers.

01  PEAK Barnabas Adria Mobil 44:39
02  VALTER Attila Team Visma | Lease a Bike + 10
03  PELIKAN Janos - + 59
04  FETTER Erik Team Polti Kometa + 01:20
05  FILUTAS Viktor Karcag Cycling + 02:56
06  WERMESER Zsombor Team MBH Bank Colpack Ballan + 03:00
07  SZALAY Dániel - + 03:25
08  PUSPOKI Daniel Green Riders + 03:58
09  DINA Marton ATT Investments + 05:28
10  HRENKO Norbert Karcag Cycling + 06:18
11  SOLYMOSI Marton Karcag Cycling + 07:43
12  SZEKELY Benedek - + 10:33

Kazakhstan

With failed home Asian Championships in minds, Astana Qazaqstan needed to make a statement at the National Championships. This meant leaving all competition in the dust. And that's exactly what the World Tour formation did, occupying top 5 of the result sheet. The title went to the most experienced of the squad: 38 years old Dmitriy Gruzdev. For Gruzdev, who was 6th in the discipline at 2012 World Championships, it's his fourth chrono title. In addition to that, the rider of the Astana Qazaqstan Development Team Andrey Remkhe took the U23 title.

01  GRUZDEV Dmitriy Astana Qazaqstan Team 42:33
02  CHZHAN Igor Astana Qazaqstan Team + 11
03  BRUSSENSKIY Gleb Astana Qazaqstan Team + 11
04  KUZMIN Anton Astana Qazaqstan Team + 01:03
05  VINOKUROV Nicolas Astana Qazaqstan Team + 01:22
06  ZHUMAKAN Alisher Almaty Astana Motors + 01:24
07  MARUKHIN Daniil Astana Qazaqstan Team + 02:22
08  PRONSKIY Daniil Vino SKO Team + 03:23
09  SHTEIN Iogan Vino SKO Team + 04:08
10  TURAR Assylkhan Almaty Astana Motors + 05:00
11  LUCHSHENKO Sergey - + 05:10
12  AZEN Gabiden - + 07:47
13  KARMAZHAKOV Sergey - + 08:03
14  ZHIZHIN Fedor - + 11:44

Estonia

On Tuesday, another experienced WorldTour matador Rein Taaramae entered the Estonian Championships with three back-to-back domestic titles. Thus considered a big pre-race favourite over the 30 km time trial. His biggest competitor turned out to be Norman Vahtra (Van Rysel-Roubaix), a man with WorldTour experience from Israel - Premier Tech. The two shared same times on each split. In the end, it was Taaramae who had a little bit more left in the tank, and massively supported by his wife Hannah in the teamcar, he defeated Vahtra by 5 seconds.

01  TAARAMÄE Rein Intermarché-Wanty 35:41
02  VAHTRA Norman Van Rysel-Roubaix + 05
03  KANNIMÄE Taavi Hawaii Express + 18
04  NISU Oskar Ferei Quick-Panda Podium Mongolia + 38
05  RAGILO Frank Aron Dev. Team dsm-firmenich PostNL + 45
06  KARPENKO Gleb Ferei Quick-Panda Podium Mongolia + 01:27
07  BAUER Mikk CC Villeneuve Saint-Germain + 01:59
08  ÄRM Rait Van Rysel-Roubaix + 02:05
09  KÜÜT Oskar Voltas-Tartu 2024 by CCN + 03:16
10  KARLEP Georg Rein Taaramäe Rattaklubi + 03:18
11  SAUL Evar Levante Fuji Shizuoka + 03:20
12  LENZIUS Martti Voltas-Tartu 2024 by CCN + 03:33
13  VEEVO Rait Peloton + 03:53
14  MÄRTSON Märt Hawaii Express + 04:01
15  MIKK Margus - + 05:05
16  LEIDT Markus Peloton + 05:39

Place comments

666

0 Comments

More comments

You are currently seeing only the comments you are notified about, if you want to see all comments from this post, click the button below.

Show all comments