Adria Mobil completed a fantastic Tour de Sloevenie in the best possible fashion when their sprinter Marko Kump won the final stage in a bunch sprint, beating Maximilano Richeze (Lampre-Merida) and Chris Sutton (Sky) into the minor podium positions. His teammate Primoz Roglic finished safely in the peloton to secure the overall victory, with Mikel Nieve (Sky) and Jure Golcer (Felbermayr) completing the podium.

As a small continental team, Adria Mobil found themselves with a daunting task in their home race Tour de Slovenie which is always the highlight of their season. With several pro continental teams and WorldTour squads Lampre-Merida and Sky on the start line, the Slovenians were not expected to dominate the race.

However, the local heroes had a fantastic race that saw them come away with two stage wins and the overall victory after four days of fast racing. Already yesterday they made the event a memorable one when super talent Primoz Roglic won the queen stage and took a narrow overall lead.

Hence, they went into today’s flat final stage with the big objective of bringing their leader safely to the finish to secure the overall victory. However, they also hoped to set up sprinter Marko Kump for a potential victory if it came down to a bunck kick.

It was no easy day for the small team as the race got off to a brutally fast start. The riders covered more than 49km during the first hour and the Slovenians had to respond to the many attacks that made the start so extremely fast.

In the end, they allowed a non-dangerous 7-rider break to get clear and then left it to Lampre-Merida to bring it back together for the expected bunch sprint. With Roglic safe, they decided to give it a go in the final dash to the line and that turned out to be a wise decision.

Despite finding himself up against renowned WorldTour sprinters, Kump proved that he is back to his best after a few disappointing years at Tinkoff-Saxo. The local hero powered clear to hold off Maximilano Richeze and Chris Sutton and win the final stage for the second time in his career.

Roglic rolled safely across the line and so secured himself the overall victory with a 5-second advantage over Mikel Nieve. In a great race for the home country, Jure Golcer completed the podium to make it two local riders in the top 3.

Davide Appollonio (Androni) finished fourth and that was enough to win the points jersey while Mauro Finetto (Southeast) was the best climber. Domen Novak made things even better for Adria Mobil by being the best young rider and they also won the teams classification with a 31-second advantage over Sky.

Most riders now turn their attention to next week’s national championships which are also the next major events in Slovenia

A flat stage

After the queen stage, it was back into flatter terrain for the final stage which brought the riders over 165.5km from Rogaska Slatina to Novo Mesto. The first 60km were completely flay and led to a hilly middle part with two steep category 3 climbs. However, the final 75km were descending and as the stage ended with two laps of a flat 8.2km circuit and four laps of a flat 5km circuit, a bunch sprint was the expected outcome.

All riders who finished yesterday’s stage were present when the peloton rolled out for the neutral ride under a sunny sky. As usual, they got the race off to a fast start with lots of attack and Adria Mobil had to work hard to control the situation.

A fast start

A 6-rider break managed to get a decent advantage but before they could be identified, they were brought back. Adria Mobil neutralized all attempts and so the peloton could sprint for the points at the first intermediate sprint at the 28.2km mark where Davide Appollonio (Androni) was first across the line, followed by Ildar Arslanov (Rusvelo) and Pieter Jacobs (Topsport Vlaanderen).

Lampre-Merida and Bardiani were the most active teams in the attacking but things were still together at the 41.5km mark where Salvatore Puccio (Sky) beat Appollonio and Otto Vergaerde (Topsport) in the second intermediate sprint. Finally, the elastic snapped after more than an hour during which the riders had covered 49km.

The break takes off

Eduard Vorganov (Katusha), Chris Jones (Unitedhealthcare), Jacobs, Andrea Fedi (Southeast), Gianfranco Zilioli (Androni), Juan Pablo Valencia (Colombia) and Alessandro Malaguti (Nippo-Vini Fantini) quickly got an advantage of 2 minutes as the peloton slowed down. That allowed Jones to beat Jacobs and Fedi in the third intermediate sprint but when Zilioli led Valencia and Malaguti across the line in the first KOM sprint, the gap had gone down to 1.30.

It was Adria Mobil working in the peloton and they kept the gap between 2.00 and 3.00 for a while. Meanwhile, Vorganov beat Jacobs and Jones in the final KOM sprint of the race.

Lampre-Merida start to chase

The gap had grown to nearly three minutes before Lampre-Merida started to chase. Moments later, Malaguti led Zilioli and Jacobs across the line in the final intermediate sprint.

Lampre-Merida had brought the gap down to 2.30 at the feed zone and at the 115km mark, it was only 1.10. They entered Novo Mesto with an advantage of 45 seconds and at the first passage of the line it was only 30 seconds.

The break is caught

With 26km to go, the breakaway was caught and this opened the door for Giacomo Berlato (Nippo) to try a solo attack. He got an advantage of 10 seconds before he was brought back with 12km to go.

A very active Jacobs attacked again but he was brought back with 7km to go. Adria Mobil was now in control and they ended the race in the perfect way, with Kump sprinting to the win and Roglic taking the overall victory.