A superb performance by NSN Cycling Team – in particular, Krists Neilands, who came within 550 meters of his first win in nearly seven years – on the final day of the Tour de Hongrie ended in disappointment after race officials stripped Nadav Raisberg of what would have been the best result of his career.
Raisberg crossed the line sixth in Veszprém, but about an hour later the race jury ruled that the Israeli rider had deviated from his sprint line and relegated him to 45th place.
As expected, the Israeli rider expressed deep frustration with the decision.
He says: “This decision is unfair to me. I was actually the rider who got cut off, and because of that I lost the chance for an even better result.
“It really hurts to lose what would have been the best result of my career. It’s frustrating, but I’m confident I’ll achieve even bigger results in the future. Right now, though, it hurts a lot.”
Sports Director Dror Pekatch agreed with Raisberg, adding: “We reviewed the footage of the sprint and could not see any justification for this decision, but unfortunately our position was not accepted.
“I feel very sorry for Nadav and completely understand his frustration. But he will have more opportunities, and I’m sure he will fulfill his potential and achieve even greater results.”
But before the disappointment, the team had every reason to be proud of what unfolded on the road today.
Sometimes athletes need a wake-up call — that painful feeling of disappointment — to bring out the very best version of themselves.
And that is exactly what happened on the final stage of the Tour of Hungary, when NSN Cycling Team lined up for what seemed like a battle for little more than pride after several days without major results.
With very little to lose, the team decided to go all-in and race aggressively. The move came with around 40 kilometers to go, while the peloton looked passive and everyone waited for UAE Team Emirates to make a move, as they had the rider closest in the general classification to the Lidl-Trek race leader Jakob Söderqvist.
Instead, Israeli national champion Rotem Tene launched a massive effort at the front, riding full gas for nearly 10 minutes and reducing the gap to the breakaway to under a minute.
Team leader Neilands had been waiting for exactly this moment. When a select group of the strongest riders in the race attacked into fierce headwinds, he not only followed them but soon found himself off the front with two other riders.
For nearly 20 kilometers, the trio managed to hold a gap of around 25 seconds over the peloton. But heartbreak came just 500 meters from the finish line, when they were finally caught.
Neilands, who won this race in June 2019 and was looking to claim his first victory since the Grand Prix de Wallonie three months after that success, took pride in finally delivering the kind of performance he had been searching for.
He says: “I would say it was a really good day. I was just really disappointed about yesterday’s final and how it went, because my legs were really good. I felt like I didn’t really get the chance to show that. Today was another opportunity — actually the last one here.
“The guys did an amazing job again, keeping me in good position and bringing me to the front when it mattered. Then, when the race exploded, it was all about the legs. I’m happy with how it went, but at the same time I’m disappointed because they caught us in the final kilometer.
“Of course I believed we could win. We had a nice gap and all three of us worked really well together. I truly believed we could make it, but in the final three kilometers the headwind became too strong. I felt like we were no longer moving forward.”
And back to Raisberg. The young Israeli was already disappointed even before the commissars gave him an even stronger reason to feel frustrated.
“With 300 meters to go, I could already see the podium within reach,” he says. “But then I got cut off and pushed toward the barriers, and I lost all my momentum.”