When the decisive four-man group at Dwars door Vlaanderen formed on the Paterberg, it contained two rainbow jersey winners from the 2012 World Championships in Valkenburg. Philippe Gilbert, winner of the elite road race that day, was key to shredding the lead group, with the winner of the U23 title, Alexey Lutsenko, one of only three riders able to stay in touch. In the end, both had to settle for the podium as tactics rather than legs decided the outcome, with Gilbert´s lesser-decorated Quick-Step Floors teammate Yves Lampaerts disappearing up the road in the final 10km. Lutsenko, a great hope at Astana and seen as something of a successor to Alexander Vinokourov as the next star Kazakh rider, was greeted with high fives, cheers, and cries of `good job´ as he arrived back at the Astana bus after his trip to the podium.ADVERTISEMENT `Fifty-fifty´ was how the 24-year-old himself felt about his ride. `I´m happy with the podium because it´s a great result, but of course I´m slightly disappointed because it could have been better and maybe I could have won this race today, because I felt really good,` he told Cyclingnews and a Belgian reporter. `But Quick-Step was clearly the strongest team, they had two guys at the front and that made it really hard to invent something. It was a good result, though, and a good performance, and I hope that I can get even more out of the coming races.` Lutsenko´s performance was all the more impressive given the amount of work he had to do for teammate Matti Breschel. The pair found themselves at the head of affairs when Gilbert attacked on the Berendries with over 75km remaining, and Lutsenko set about doing long turns to help the lead group of nearly 20 maintain its advantage. A burgeoning cobbled classics talent
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