Illnur Zakarin of Katusha has won the Tour De Romandie.
The final stage was a 17.6km time trial in Lausanne which saw race leader Illnur Zakarin of Katusha last to go down the ramp.
Former World Hour Record holder Matthias Brandle of IAM cycling set the first time to beat when he finished in 24.52 at an average speed of 41.728 km/h.
Katusha's Anton Vorobyev beat that with a time of 24.13 as did Jos Van Emden of LottoNL Jumbo who finished in 24.12.
Emden was still in the lead after fifty riders had finished but stage favourite Tony Martin of Etixx Quick Step was on the road. The German, who has been in good time trialling form this season, finished in 23.17 with an average speed of 44.559 km/h just after Rohan Dennis who lost his World Hour Record to Alex Dowsett finished in 23.39.
Former Tour De France winners Chris Froome and Vincenzo Nibali were unable to beat the German's time but Simon Spillak of Katusha got close finishing eleven seconds down.
In came the race leader Illnur Zakarin and although he finished thirteen seconds down on Tony Martin who won the stage, it was enough to give him the race overall from Spillak by seventeen seconds and thirty five from Chris Froome.
Speaking about his overall victory to the Katusha team press office, Zakarin said: "Honestly I did not expect I could win this race.
"Yes, I wanted to be in form here and wanted to fight for the top 5. During the race I did my best, especially yesterday and today in the time trial. I worked to get the best possible result but of course this is a big surprise for me to win here. I have not analysed the results of today’s TT and I need to do that to understand what happened.
2All I know, I did full gas, 100%, and now I am really happy. I want to thank my team – all the guys, the management, sports directors and staff for their support and great help. My victory is a victory of the whole team!."
Source: DSG
