Not selecting Ricco for the worlds? Bad mistake, according to Ricco himself. After being very disappointed that he wasn't selected, Ricco was looking for some retaliation.
Ricco still had 3 races left. 2 in his home country, and the final race in Japan. The first one was Milano - Torino. A road not perfectly made for Ricco, but with the Cobra, you never know. On the only difficulty of the day, he blasted away from the rest in to the lead. He never gave it away, although the others did come close at the end.
Second race, was a way more prestigious race; the Giro dell'Emilia. Last year a PT classic won by Cunego, this year a HC classic, with an ideal profile for Ricco. We also had Kirchen here as support, as we needed a top 10 for the sponsors, so always have some back-up. On the little hills to the finish, there were countless of attacks, ultimately forming a group of 13 riders. Both Kirchen and Ricco were in that group. On the final climb, Ricco blasted away, showing what could have been done at the worlds. He won the race in front of Ginanni and Schumacher. Kirchen finished a nice 6th.
So Ricco did the double, but is still hoping to get that other jersey in the absence of Cunego; il Tricolore. This races however, have ensured us one thing though, a good lead on Pendleton's, which brings us closer to the automatic promotion spots.
Italian Worlds leader, Ginanni gets beaten by Ricco
We started the season as a new team, with no experience at all, which led to a few bold decisions. Mainly, our goal to achieve promotion. There was quite a lot of criticism around this. A few examples:
We say: Ricco will deliver but not promotion
Winning Trentino, or gaining promotion. Pretty much impossible goals.
There is no way he should beat us unless he is a genius in the transfer market, in which case I can accept that he is a better manager and deserves to go to the PT.
In the end, we proved friend and foe (and myself) wrong by finishing 5th in the final rankings, which means we are going to the PT! Also, winning Trentino wasn't our goal, but we won it anyways .
Originally, i did think this goal was possible if i looked at last year's season. But in the start of the season i actually lost faith, thinking it would indeed be impossible. But as the season went on, results started to come. We started small, until our first big win by Kirchen in Castilla. From then on, we had a very consistent season, which in the end, delivered us promotion!
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