Roglic wins Tre Valli Varesine

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Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) capitalised on his late season form with victory in Tre Valli Varesine. The Vuelta a Espana winner attacked with 500m to go after Luis León Sánchez’s (Astana) late move was nullified with just under a kilometer to go.

There was no response when Roglič immediately countered, with the Slovenian finishing clear of Giovanni Visconti and last year’s winner Toms Skujinš to take his second win in three days after claiming the Giro dell’Emilia last weekend.

The race was overshadowed when a chase group were sent the wrong way on the finishing circuit as they clawed back time Sánchez with just over 10km to go. The group contained a host of pre-race favourites including Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain-Merida), Davide Formolo (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Daniel Martin (UAE Team Emirates), but by the time they had realized the error and turned back it was too late, with the main field replacing them as Sánchez’s closest rivals on the road.

The controversy didn’t stop there with Sánchez forced to bunny hop a traffic island after a moto and race vehicle inexplicably blocked the road soon after. The Astana rider survived the incident and bravely hung on before vicious accelerations from Pierre Latour (AG2R La Mondiale) and Gianni Moscon (Team Ineos) finally brought him to heel.

Latour, Moscon and Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) were quickly joined by Roglič, but the Vuelta winner used his momentum, and his obvious form, to draw out an insurmountable lead. By the time Fuglsang began to give a half-hearted chase Roglič was sitting up to celebrate his late season form and ahead of this weekend’s Il Lombardia he looks like the rider to beat.

"Again I'm happy with the finish and that I won. The team did again a great job controlling the race for me from the very beginning. And then in the end I was lucky with the guys who went the wrong way," the Jumbo Visma rider said at the finish.

"It's amazing. Like I said in the Giro dell'Emilia. I’m just enjoying it. It would be nice to go on holiday but we have Lombardia. We'll see about that race. I'm relaxed and I'm enjoying things. We'll see how it goes."

How it unfolded

Michael Gogl (Trek-Segafredo), Umberto Marengo (Neri Sottoli), Jose Herrada (Cofidis), and Davide Ballerini (Astana) formed the day’s main break, but on a newly devised finishing circuit Herrada was the first to yield on the third ascent of the Via Montello climb. 

Marengo was the next rider to lose contact as the peloton increased their pace and the break began to splinter further. Only Gogl and Ballerini and remained with 40km to go, but soon enough Ballerini was alone as David Gaudu (FDJ) attacked from the peloton and brought George Bennett and a string of riders with him.

By the time Ballerini was caught the new lead group contained Gaudo, Rudy Mollard (FDJ), Diego Ulissi, Dan Martin (UAE Team Emirates), Eddie Dunbar (Team Ineos), Bennett, Sanchez (Astana), Michael Woods (EF Education First), Formolo, Dylan Teuns (Bahrain-Merida), Wilco Kelderman (Team Sunweb), and Mathias Frank (A2GR La Mondiale).

The group held the main field at 28 seconds, but on the Montello climb Sanchez took flight as Roglic and his Jumbo-Visma team struggled to remain on terms. By the time the Dutch squad had brought the chase group to within sight, Sanchez had established a near 40-second lead but the race changed dramatically when Formolo followed a race moto through the wrong turn at a roundabout. 

The move cost him and his companions the chance to compete for the win but left Team Ineos and Jumbo-Visma with numbers to play in the final.

With Fuglsang marking everything in sight, Sanchez looked on course to take the win but he buckled in the last two kilometres after an excellent stint on the front from Salvatore Puccio. 

When Latour and then Moscon accelerated, it looked as though Fuglsang would have the measure of both riders as he loomed on their shoulders, but Roglic – the last rider to make contact in the four-man move – dove past the trio before soloing to another win.