Michele Gazzoli and Antonio Puppio stand out with the Italian National Team in the Etoile d´Or

Michele Gazzoli and Antonio Puppio, Italian riders of the Kometa Cycling Team, stood out this Saturday in the French Etoile d´Or, the fourth round of the U23 Nations Cup in which they competed called by their selection and in which their colleague Alexander Konychev won.

The son of the mythical Dmitry Konychev escaped in the last minutes of the race, 180 kilometers between Lussac-les-Châteaux and Civaux, reaching the finish line with a couple of seconds on a very broken bunch due to a fall within the last kilometer.  In the volley, Gazzoli could finish third, behind Marten Kooistra and ahead of his compatriot Alberto Dainese.

“It was a very difficult finish. There was a fall in the last kilometre and I was trapped, but I was able to get back to the front with 300 metres to go. By then the Dutch had gone. But it’s a good result,” says Gazzo.

Antonio Puppio, for his part, finished tenth, four seconds behind the winner. “I’m very happy, I had very good legs and we were able to do the job in the best possible way,” he says.

Both Gazzoli and Puppio were part of the Italian U23 team that competed again in France the following day, specifically in an Entre Brenne et Montmorillonnais in which the Italian team took the victory with Alberto Dainese. Puppio returned to work in the interests of his teammates, while Gazzoli was affected by a crash about 80 kilometers to the end of this race of 183.3.

(automatic translation, sorry for mistakes)