A rainy and windy weather provided slippery roads and overall difficult conditions for this last, 5th stage of Vuelta Ciclista a Andalusia with tricky final kilometres through the steep and narrow streets of Coin.
The overall strategy of sport directors Harald Morscher and Vladimir Miholjevic was to do everything possible to keep the high position of the team, among the top 10 positions for Javier Moreno and Ondrej Cink and, of course, to keep the high ranking of the whole team in the team classification.
Just a few kilometres after the start and in line with discussed strategy, Domen Novak joined the breakaway group of 8 riders that stayed separated through all climbs: Puerto del Viento (Cat. 3), Puerto de las Abejas (Cat. 3) and Alto de Jarapalos (Cat. 3). The gap between upfront riders and the peloton was about 4,5 minutes the majority of the time, but heading to Coin, at 130th km, the peloton came 2.5 minutes close to the breakaway group.
Domen Novak stayed calm and focused during the race, and kept good position for final kilometers, where his eyes were on Tim Wellens and other four older and much experienced riders.
BAHRAIN MERIDA Pro Cycling Team kept a good position in the peloton and showed great performance, despite heavy weather conditions. In the last kilometre of the stage, the peloton came to a little over a minute gap to the breakaway riders, but could not catch them, also due to hard conditions.
And then in the last few hundred meters our young rider, Domen Novak put all his strength in his final sprint and finished 5th at the final stage of Vuelta Ciclista a Andalusia. Great result for him and the team!
Domen was really happy after the race: "It was a big day for me, getting the 5th place in a very hard stage. I got very good tactics plan from Vladimir Miholjevi? and it really worked out. I’m looking forward to the next races in the season".
BAHRAIN MERIDA Pro Cycling Team is the 2nd ranked team in the overall classification, Ondrej Cink took 9th place and Javier Moreno 10th place and is also the best Andalusian rider of Ruta del Sol.
Harald Morscher gave an overview of the Vuelta Ciclista a Andalusia and said: "I am very happy with the performance that our riders showed during the last few days. I am glad to see the synergy of the experienced and young riders in our team. This is how we want to carry on in all of the upcoming races. I am proud of our riders and I also wish a fast recovery to Ion Izaguirre who was our real leader these days in every segment."

Source: BNA