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Marc Hirschi collected the victory at the Veneto Classic as UAE Team Emirates dominated the late-season Italian race, with Davide Formolo making it a team 1-2.
The pair had joined Matteo Trentin in a collective offensive on the repeat cobbled climbs of La Tisa before going clear with Alpecin-Deceuninck’s Nicola Conci on the late dirt-road climb of Diesel Farm.
They used their numerical advantage to work over their last remaining rival, Hirschi going clear on the descent with 9km to go and soloing home.
Formolo forced Conci to chase before leaving him behind in the final few kilometres to cross the line in second place, 10 seconds down on his teammate.
Conci hung on for the final podium spot, just ahead of a small chasing group, where Matteo Trentin might have made it three in the top four for UAE, had he not raised his arm to celebrate, causing him to slip to fifth.
How it unfolded
Filippo Pozzato’s slate of racing in the Veneto has lengthened the Italian racing calendar by a week these past two seasons, and the Veneto Classic thus marks the final road race of the European season.
The event has ambitions of earning a WorldTour slot in the years to come – and its route is certainly worthy of that status – and for its second edition, the number of top-flight teams on the start list expanded to seven.
When the entrants were first announced, there was much interest in the presence of Lotto Soudal and Israel Start-Up, battling for their WorldTour survival, but both were already doomed to relegation by the time they lined up in Treviso on Sunday morning.
The strongest squad on paper, by some distance, was the deep line-up fielded by UAE Team Emirates, with Marc Hirschi, Matteo Trentin and Davide Formolo all featuring.
The race also marked the final act of Davide Rebellin’s 30-year professional career, which can be divided into two neat parts by his suspension following his positive test for CERA at the 2008 Olympics. The Italian has spent more than a decade locked outside the WorldTour, riding primarily at Continental level, and he returned to his home region to bring the curtain down on his career at the age of 51. Rebellin stood in first position ahead of the gruppo on the start line, and he was afforded a light round of applause from his peers and the spectators who had gathered on Treviso’s Piazza dei Signori.
The pace was brisk in the opening stages as the peloton left Trevisio beneath hazy Autumn sunshine and set off towards Conegliano….
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