Ardennes week came to a close on Sunday at the 101st edition of Liège – Bastogne – Liège, with Team Katusha active all the moves, placing Joaquim Rodriguez on the third step of the podium in the final result. At 253 km, the course for La Doyenne featured ten rated climbs on a hard day of riding that saw rain and many crashes on course.

Riders from Team Katusha rode aggressively in the race, creating breaks and chasing down the moves of others, finally sending Daniel Moreno on the attack in the last kilometer of racing.

“When you attack as the first rider, you know it will be impossible to win. After the Flèche Wallonne we regretted that we did not attack earlier. That's why we wanted to make this race very hard today and we did. It was a very tough day with high speeds all day long. First we sent Caruso to the front and then also Moreno in the last kilometer. Moreno's move made me happy. I saw that he was able to win this race. He really could have won... On the other hand I knew that when he was caught, it would be quite impossible for me to win against Valverde. Alejandro rode a very intelligent race. He really estimated well the distance to the finish compared to the Moreno gap. Valverde is strong and has a strong sprint as a bonus,” said team leader Joaquim Rodriguez.

Coming under the red kite with 1000 meters to go, Daniel Moreno set off for the finish line, hoping to draw out other riders, but patience was the name of the game and he was brought back near the 300 m to go banner as a reduced group prepared for the final. At 100 m Alejandro Valverde launched a powerful sprint and overcame the others, leaving Julian Alaphilippe (Etixx – Quick Step) and Joaquim Rodriguez to take second and third places, with teammate Moreno rounding out the top ten.  As the third oldest winner of the race at age 35, Valverde also claimed his third career victory in the race (2008, 2006). Today’s winning time was 6:14.20.

“I think we can be happy with the way we did today's race. We did absolutely everything we could and the only thing we missed was a victory. The team was really great and all of the guys did a perfect job from the beginning of the race until the very last kilometer. We can be proud with our race. In the final, Caruso and Moreno did everything possible for Joaquim and “Purito” was very strong today. That's cycling but we are proud that we saw a very strong Team Katusha today,” added general manager Viacheslav Ekimov.

With the strong and consistent results of his spring racing campaign, Joaquim Rodriguez moves into fifth place for the overall WorldTour individual ranking. Teammate Alexander Kristoff is currently third with Alejandro Valverde at the top of the list.

Team Katusha is ranked fourth in the team category with Etixx – Quick Step in first place. Racing continues this week on Tuesday with the start of the 6-day Tour of Romandie stage race.