Eduard Prades continued the excellent season for Caja Rural when he powered to victory in the uphill sprint at the Coppa Sabatini. After Bardiani had done lots of work to set up defending champion Sonny Colbrelli, the Spaniard managed to hold off Maurits Lammertink (Roompot) and Mauro Finetto (Southeast) to take the second wins of his 2015 season.

Caja Rural got the year off to a very bad start as they were marred by numerous injuries and illnesses in the first months. However, since they opened their account at the Vuelta a Castilly y Leon in April, they have been absolutely flying and in the beginning of August, it was Eduard Prades who joined the list of winners by taking the 16th team win in the Volta ao Portugal.

However, since then the team has been unable to achieve a single win and despite their heroic effort in the Vuelta a Espana where both Jose Goncalves and Pello Bilbao took second places and Omar Fraile won the mountains jersey, it looked like they would end the season with a string of near-misses. They only had three chances to break the drought: the three Italian semi-classics this week.

After the opening race, the Coppa Sabatini, it is clear that the team can head into the off-season with lots of confidence and again it was Prades who delivered the goods. The Spaniard made use of his puncheur skills to come out on top in the uphill sprint that always decides the Italian race.

The early break had been caught with 25km to go as the peloton started the penultimate lap of the hard 12.2km finishing circuit that included a punchy 1km climb to the finish. At this point, fast riding by Bardiani had already created a huge selection and this opened the door for new attacks.

Sjoerd van Ginneken (Roompot) was the first rider to make a move and he was briefly joined by Francesco Gavazzi (Southeast) before the pair were brought back. It was Bardiani trying to control the situation with a bit of help from MTN-Qhubeka and Topsport Vlaanderen.

With 15km to go, Rusvelo hit the front but it was Natnael Berhane who hit the front for MTN-Qhubeka as they went up the lower slopes of the climb for the penultimate time. Edoardo Zardini took over for Bardiani and he had whittled the group down to 30 riders as they started the final lap.

Bardiani set a fast pace until CCC and Ag2r took over, meaning that no one could try a move. Lampre-Merida took over with 4km to go as it was a huge fight for position for the final climb.

Enrico Barbin led the peloton under the flamme rouge as he tried to set Sonny Colbrelli up for a repeat win and he strung the group completely out on the climb. He stayed on the front until 400m remained where Valerio Conti (Lampre-Merida) tried to attack.

Jan Bakelants (Ag2r) joined the Italian but the move didn’t pay off for the pair. Prades sprinted past them to take the win while Maurits Lammertink narrowly edged out Mauro Finetto in a photo finish in the battle for second.

The series of late-season Italian semi-classics continues on Saturday with the most prestigious race. The Giro dell’Emilia finishes on the steep and famous San Luca climb where the climbers are set to battle it out for one final time this year.

A circuit race

The 63rd edition of the Coppa Sabatini was held on a 198.1km course around the city of Pelicioli. The route was unchanged compared to last year and was made up of three different circuit. The first one was 21.1km long and largely flat and would only be covered once. Then the riders did six laps of another flat 17.3km circuit before they ended the race by doing six laps of much harder 12.2km circuit. It included a tough 1km rise to the finish, making it a race suited to puncheurs.

It was a cloudy and dry day when the riders gathered for the start and it was the typical scenario for an Italian one-day race as the opening part was extremely fast with lots of attacks. No one had managed to escape after 11km of racing and the riders had been attacking for 30 minutes when Gianfranco Zilioli (Androni) and Arthur Vanoverberghe (Topsport Vlaanderen) managed to escape.

Cam bridges the gap

Maxime Cam (Bretagne) took off in pursuit while the peloton slowed down and they had already been distanced by 4.30 when they ended their lap of the first circuit. Cam was at 1.20 and had a tough job ahead of him.

The peloton allowed the gap to go out to 5.37 before Nippo-Vini Fantini started to chase. Meanwhile, Cam was slowly getting closer and so the front duo waited for the Frenchman who made the junction at the 30km mark.

Nippo set the pace

Bardiani joined forces with Nippo and those two teams had brought the gap down to 4.50 at the end of the first lap of the second circuit. They didn’t really chase though and so the gap was again 5.27 at the 50km mark.

Bardiani left it to Nippo to do the work but they were not really riding. Hence, the gap was 6.34 as they entered the final 125km.

The chase gets organized

At the end of the second hour, the gap had gone out to a maximum of 6.58 and this was the sign for the peloton to up the pace. Bardiani and Colombia joined forces with Nippo and those three teams had brought the gap down to 5.23 at the 100km mark.

Zilioli, Cam and Vanoverberghe were constantly losing ground and the gap was just 5 minutes 12km later. At this point, Colombia upped the pace further and brought the gap down to 4.13 at the end of the fifth lap of the circuit.

Bardiani do some damage

Rusvelo, Bardiani and Nippo took over from Colombia and continued their steady comeback before Nippo put in a big acceleration. With four laps of the final circuit left, the gap was only 2.07.

Bardiani took complete control and rode very fast to make the gap melt away.  At the end of four hours of racing, the escapees were only 28 seconds ahead.

The break is caught

Cam was the first rider to sit up but at this point, Zilioli and Vanoverberghe only had an advantage of 7 seconds. Meanwhile, Bardiani had made the peloton split in two due to their fast past and they brought it all back together with 36km to go.

Just as the junction was made, the peloton slowed down and suddenly Vanoverberghe and Zilioli were again 20 seconds ahead. MTN-Qhubeka took over and they finally ended the day for the break with 25km to go where Luca Chirico and Manuel Bongiorno (Bardiani) went down in a crash. That cost a bit in the end and so the Italian team was unable to prevent Prades from winning the race.