43-year-old Davide Rebellin proved that he is still able to mix it up with the best when he won the Giro dell'Emilia, one of Italy's biggest one-day races. Being competitive at such a high age, the Italian hopes to inspire other people to continue riding their bike.

All year Davide Rebellin has been his usual consistent self but until today he had been unable to take a single individual win. Today he finally broke his drought and he did so by winning one of the biggest races on his schedule.

With 4 previous podium finishes, Rebellin has always been one of the best riders in the Giro dell’Emilia and today he again proved that he is perfectly suited to the hard uphill finish on the San Luca climb in Bologna. After a gradual selection had whittled down the main group to just 6 riders, Rebellin was still there and the waited for the final of 5 passages of the climb to make his move.

For a brief moment, it seemed that he had lost it all as Angel Madrazo had launched a strong attack from the bottom, passing early escapee Gianfranco Zilioli (Androni) in the process. At the red kite, the Spaniard was 20 seconds ahead but Rebellin still had a strong acceleration left in the tank.

When Francesco Bongiorno (Bardiani) made an attack, Rebellin countered the move and he passed the fading Madrazo with just a few hundred metres to go. While Rebellin soloed across the line, the Caja Rural managed to hold off a fast-finishing Franco Pellizotti to take second.

"It came at the end of a very selective race," he said after the race. "I was a bit worried by Zilioli'a attack as he was very strong but we managed to catch him and I decided to give it all on the final climb."

Rebellin was pleased that the race had started very fast which made it possible for him to use his puncheur skills in the "challenging finale which is  reminiscent of the Fleche Wallonne and the Northern Classics."

"Age is not a problem for me  because I see that the values ​​are the same as they were 10 years ago," he said. "When you have the will and determinationm you can prove that you can get some results  even when you are more than 40 years old. I can still do better. I is nice to show that at a certain age you can get great results, take great satisfaction and this can be an example not only for the young riders but also for those who are riding at age 50 and support cycling." 

The win was Rebellin's first in 2014

"This year I have not done a lot of classics races like Liege and Fleche," he said. "Those are the routes where I can express myself better. My condition is great and I wanted to finish the season with a big win. I dedicate this to my wife. She suffers so much with me and I wanted to dedicate a great success to her.

"The spectators made me very pleased and gave me great satisfaction. They love me and love me more and more because I am more than 40 years old and still there to suffer and battle with the young riders. For them it is a beautiful demonstration."