Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious) triumphed on stage 4 of the Tour of Slovenia, accelerating late from an elite lead group to take the stage win at the summit finish of Krvavec.
The Basque racer finished three seconds up on Paul Double (Polti-Kometa) and race leader Giovanni Aleotti (Bora-Hansgrohe), with VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè pair Giulio Pellizzari and Domenico Pozzovivo completing the top 5 as part of the same GC group.
Aleotti retains the GC lead heading into the flat final stage to Novo Mesto, with the stage 3 winner looking well-set to take the overall title on Sunday.
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The battle for the win – and for the GC – began on the final climb of the 147km stage, 9km from the line as the early breakaway was brought back. Cyril Barthe (Groupama-FDJ) and Johan Meens (Bingoal WB) were the last men standing from the eight-man early move, which at one point had led by five minutes on the largely flat run to the finishing climb.
On the way up, VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè and Jayco-AlUla were putting in the work on the front of the peloton, slimming down the group as the 7.7% average gradients bit.
The big move came at 4km from the line as Bilbao led the way at the front as major names including Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility), Jhonatan Narváez (Ineos Grenadiers) and Valerio Conti (Corratec-Vini Fantini) dropped away.
Up front, Bilbao was joined by Aleotti, Pozzovivo and Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) as Pellizzari also found himself in trouble, though Healy only held on to the 3.5km mark.
The lead group was back up to four as Double worked his across over the following kilometre, with the Briton soon making an attempt to go solo at the front without success. A relative slowing up among the leaders heading into the steep, double-digit gradients of the final kilometre saw the chase group hone into view, with Pellizzari making a move to bridge across.
He’d make it back, but just as he joined his teammate Pozzovivo and the rest of the stage contenders, Bilbao was pulling the trigger on his final acceleration. At around 200 metres to go, the 34-year-old jumped away, duly taking his first win of the season and 17th of his career.
Heading into the sprinter-friendly closing stage, Aleotti’s GC lead remains at 12 seconds, though with Bilbao now taking over second place from Narváez. Pellizzari is second at 25 seconds, level on time with teammate Pozzovivo, while Steff Cras (TotalEnergies) lies in fifth at 34 seconds.
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