Irvine breaks his duck in Larciano

Australian Declan Irvine burst out of the peloton in the early kilometers of todays GP Industria & Artigianato in Italy to make the breakaway for the first time in his career before Andrea Peron racked up another top 20.

Head sports director Massimo Podenzana:

“Great job by Declan today. It was our big goal to get in the breakaway and I told all the guys at the start that they needed to be at the front and following all the moves until the right one goes.”

“Declan followed the right guys today and this was a very good race for him to get in his first breakaway. They stayed out front for close to 130km and it’s great experience to get under his belt.

“Andrea has raced here before and even though the climb was different, he knew what to expect and fought hard to be part of the front group at the end. He’s not a climber and this is certainly not a sprinters race.”

Declan Irvine:

“I’m stoked to have finally made it into a breakaway. I’ve been trying for five years and to do it in a race as hard as Gp Larciano is really satisfying. We knew it was important for us to be up there today, we came without a pure climber and getting out front to show ourselves was the main objective.”

“I can understand why some people thing getting into the breakaway is an easy thing to do, from the outside it probably looks simple, but it’s a actually really hard and there’s some luck involved. Attacks came straight out of the neutral zone, but the right one didn’t stick until after close to 10km and that was my move to follow.”