WorldTour Team Katusha took a perfect double victory in the individual time trial of the Russian National Road Championships, held in Tula. The race took place in in terrible weather conditions – it was very cold and raining all the day.
Anton Vorobyev became the new Russian ITT Champion, showing the best time 1:01.17 at the 50 km distance. Another Team Katusha rider Sergei Chernetckii won the silver medal, loosing 1 minute and 6 seconds to his teammate.
Artem Ovechkin from RusVelo completed the Russian ITT Championships podium, taking the bronze medal. Ovechkin lost 1 minute and 45 seconds to the winner.
– For me this is a very important victory, I was very motivated for it. The Russian Championships were one of the main goals in the season for me. And I built all my preparation having in my mind the Russian Champs, where I wanted to be in top shape. I did a huge amount of work and spent a lot of power for it. Before the start I felt I was strong, but had some doubts if everything would be ok, because this is the first time to ride such a big distance during the race and also, the rivals are really strong here. Finally everything went well and I am happy! The race was hard – I started under heavy rain. I did not know exactly what to expect from this distance; it was hard to distribute power over the whole race. Thus my first lap was very speedy, while on the second one I suffered a little bit, but in the end I found enough energy to win. Next time such a long distance will be only at the World Championships, where I would like to proudly represent Russia, – said Anton Vorobyev.
– The weather was not the best, but I was a little bit lucky and I did most of the race without rain. But it was still cold and windy. In general, I felt quite well during the whole race. After Tour de Suisse I managed to recover and to get some rest, so today in the time trial I was in good shape. I am pretty happy with the result, this is my first podium at the Russian Championships in category Elite, – added Sergei Chernetckii.
– A victory at the Russian Championships every time is a very important achievement for Team Katusha. I am glad that it was Anton Vorobyev who won today. I think this success is very important for him. The win will give him more confidence in himself and will help to leave behind that hard period connected with injures. Anton did a very solid race, showing a strong result. He passed 50 km of a hard profile and in tough weather conditions in 1 hour 1 minute and 17 seconds – that’s really impressive. Sergei Chernetckii also did a very good race today. Today Katusha has one more victory – Gatis Smukulis won at the Latvian Championships. What a nice day for our team, – added general manager of Team Katusha, Viacheslav Ekimov.
Today’s success is the first personal win of Anton Vorobyev as a professional rider. The U23 World ITT Champion and 2-time U23 Russian Champion, Anton came into professional ranks in 2013 with Team Katusha. Last season he took two podium places as well as being part of Katusha’s victorious team time trial at a stage of Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali. This season Vorobyev took a podium place in ITT of Bayern Rundfahrt.
The win of Anton Vorobyev in the Russian ITT Championships became the 16th win for Team Katusha in 2014.
