Matej Mohorič finished 10th at the 107th edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and a solid performance from Jack Haig also saw him finish 17th, just 12 seconds behind the race winner Tadej Pogačar (Team UAE Emirates).

The 259.1 km race saw an early breakaway form of seven riders, with the peloton allowing them to have a gap of over 10 minutes. The breakaway stayed away for most of the day until around 25km to go.

Moves then started to ignite the race, but Richard Carapaz’s (Ineos Grenadiers) attack stuck, and he gained an advantage of nearly 20 seconds with under 20km to go. The gap was bridged when the pace was picked up, with a group of five riders distancing themselves from the rest of the contenders. That group’s move was decisive, seeing Pogačar (Team UAE Emirates) outsprint World Champion (Julian Alaphilippe). Mohorič eventually closed time towards the end and crossed the line in 10th.

Mohorič was hoping for more but is happy with his form: “Today we were going well with Jack, I think he was following the attacks in the final, and I put all my effort on the last climb. Unfortunately, I was unable to follow the first group, and then we didn’t manage to close the gap before the finish. I tried to sprint for the remaining places, and I pulled off 10th place, which is okay. We came for more, but I think my shape is good ahead of the Giro with Mikel. We have good ambitions in the GC and also to look for opportunities to win a stage.”

Sports Director Gorazd Štangelj shared his thoughts after the race: “We were trying to pull off a similar tactic to last year, as it’s really difficult to go across the final climb with those outstanding riders. We were not far off, with Jack doing a great job with an attack at 20km to go, but unfortunately, he didn’t gain an advantage that would help him get across the last climb, but this is cycling.

Overall, the race was really controlled all the time and not a lot of space. I would say the strong performances today were Padun with the breakaway, Haussler with positioning, Jack with the last breakaway and then Matej with the finale. Those guys gave it their all today.”

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