The Gran Premio Beghelli saw a select bunch sprint decide the race victor with Sonny Colbrelli (Bardiani) being the fastest. Manuel Belletti (Southeast) was 2nd and Roberto Ferrari (Lampre) took 3rd place.
MTN-Qhubeka p/b Samsung was put on display for the majority of the day by Merhawi Kudus, as he and Jef van Meirhaeghe (Topsport Vlaanderen) formed the 2 rider break of the day. Riding at a maximum of 4 minutes ahead of the peloton, Kudus was able to get the better of the Belgian at all the intermediate sprints and GPMs to win both those classifications today.
The two man escape was not going to survive the chase from the peloton though and they were caught with 60km to go. The final local circuit contained a climb that would be raced at full gas on each occasion, as expected, and the peloton became drastically thinned out.
The MTN man for the day, Kristian Sbaragli, was strong enough to be a part of the final selection but a long season had taken its toll on the Italian and he was not able to feature in the sprint finish today. Natnael Berhane was the highest placed finisher in 17th with Sbaragli in 19th. Nevertheless it was still a good end to the season for the MTN boys in Italy with Kudus making two trips to the podium.
“For our last race we wanted to be part of the race. We had Merhawi in the break along with a Topsport rider. They were in the move from kilometer 20 and got caught with 60km to go. Merhawi was able to win both the sprint and GPM competitions out there today which was good. Coming into the final there was a bunch sprint of approximately 40 riders. The plan was to help Kristian in the final but he didn't have the legs today and got stuck on the last corner,” sports director Alex Sans Vega said.
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