One of the leaders of WorldTour Team Katusha Iurii Trofimov won the road race title of the Russian Championships 2015 in Saransk, Mordovia. Trofimov attacked in the last lap with 13,5 km to go and managed to get a good gap, enough to win the gold medal.

"The Russian Championship is a very prestigious race and today’s success is a very important moment in my career. I was already on the podium in previous years and now everything went perfect for me to win. First of all I want to thank my team who supported me during the whole day – the guys did a perfect race. Saransk has organized great championships, so I would like to thank the city government and the event organizors. It was a tough race, so we had to do our best to get success. In the second part of the race, after a number of attacks, a group of 6 riders, including me, was in front. We managed to organize a good work in our group and we increased our advantage over the peloton. With two laps to go I tried to attack just to see what would happen but in the last lap I attacked again, this time for 100%. I was able to get away, while my teammates supported me in the back. I really struggled in the final kilometers, but finally I won," said Iurii Trofimov.

The 204 km race in the streets of the centre of Saransk began with a number of attacks. Many riders tried to escape, while Team Katusha was very active in front, working hard for its leaders. After a good attack it was Eduard Vorganov who went in a solo breakaway. Later a group of 14 joined him, while after another counterattack the lead group of 6 managed to get a substantial gap. Vladimir Isaychev, Iurii Trofimov, Sergey Lagutin and Viacheslav Kuznetsov from Katusha as well as Pavel Brutt from Tinkoff-Saxo and Sergey Belykh from ITERA-Katusha made part of this group.

With 13.5 km to go Iurii Trofimov did a powerful attack resulting in his debut gold medal in the Russian Championships. Pavel Brutt was second 15 seconds behind, while Sergey Lagutin finished 3rd, 6 seconds behind Brutt.

"Iurii Trofimov was our leader for this race and the team did all possible to help him today. The race was really hard, the first part was very fast and nervous – a lot of attacks, and our team worked hard to control the situation and to protect the leader. We’ve managed to split and to reduce the group and to create a leading group with 4 our riders: Isaychev, Kuznetsov and Lagutin did a perfect second part of the race, while Iurii Trofimov was really strong in the final, making a victorious attack. What a beautiful race," added Team Katusha’s sports director Dmitry Konyshev.

After today’s victories of Marco Haller and Iurii Trofimov Team Katusha set a new victor record. At this moment Katusha has taken 32 wins, while the best result was 30 victories at the end of 2013.