SpazioCiclismo reports that Davide Rebellin has extended his contract with Continental team Meridiana Kamen to begin his 27th season as a professional cyclist.

The 48-year-old moved to the Croatian-registered team midway through the 2019 season, but had raced for the team for one season in 2012 before moving to the CCC Polkowice Pro Continental team.

After the collapse of the Epowers Factory Racing project, Rebellin lost his contract. The team was to have been sponsored by Istvan Vargas, the Hungarian who developed the hidden motors and magnetic wheels that were allegedly used in major professional races.

More recently, Rebellin had been linked to the new Cambodian Cycling Academy and claimed he intended to retire. He had announced that the 2019 Italian Championships would be his last race, but he continued racing until the end of September. Meridiana Kamen director Antonio Giallorenzo told SpazioCiclismo, "We are very happy to have Davide back in the team. He is like family to us and an important rider."

"With his great experience, he will surely support and give knowledge to our young riders. He is a rider who has made history in the Italian cycling world, but he is still good enough to compete with the best riders. He has a great work ethic and gets up early every day to train for six hours." He deserves respect as a person and an athlete. Rebellin began his professional career with GB-MG Maglificio in 1992, before Lance Armstrong became a household name. He made his first Monumental top 10 at the Giro di Lombardia, which he entered as a trainee, and in 2004 he won the Amstel Gold Race, La Flèche Wallonne, and Liège-Bastogne-Liège to complete the then-unprecedented triple crown of the Ardennes.

In 2008, at the age of 36, he won the overall title in Paris-Nice and took the silver medal in the road race at the Beijing Olympics, but the following year, specimens from the event tested positive for CERA, a third-generation erythropoietin preparation.

He won the Flèche Wallonne, but was then banned for two years. He resumed his winning ways in the Tre Valli Vallisinne and has won 20 races since the doping ban, most recently at the 2018 Tour International de la Willaya d'Oran in Algeria.