Katusha's Simon Špilak took the biggest win of his career at the Tour de Suisse on Sunday, winning the overall classification following the stage 9 time trial in Bern.
“I am really happy!” Špilak said in a team press release. “This was a main objective in the season and I was very motivated, so to get this victory is incredible. After a lot of second and third places, finally I have managed again to win a big race. Of course this is the biggest victory in my career.”
Špilak went into the stage 9, 38km time trial in third place overall, 47 seconds behind the previous day's leader Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) and 34 seconds behind Geraint Thomas (Team Sky). As Thibaut lost time in the final stage, Thomas became the favourite to win the overall, however, the Briton only managed fifth place on the day.
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With a second-place finish in the time trial, behind winner Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin), Špilak jumped ahead to take the overall victory by five seconds ahead of Thomas and 19 ahead of Dumoulin.
“This week was a hard one, but I felt good and strong and the team provided great support for me,” he said. “I want to thank all of the guys, management and sponsors for everything they did to make this win possible.
“Yesterday I could see the circuit and I realized it suited me well. It was really hard but I like the races like this. So I was motivated and concentrated in the morning before the start.
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