Michael Matthews (Jayco-AlUla) powered to his third victory in the Grand Prix de Québec, out-sprinting Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty) and Rudy Molard (Groupama-FDJ).
All eyes were on Tour de France and Giro d'Italia champion Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) and defending champion Arnaud De Lie (Lotto Dstny) but the pair burned out their matches with an attack at the base of the kilometre-long final climb of Côte des Glacis.
When the move was extinguished by a surge from Bahrain Victorious, Matthews slotted onto the wheels and waited for the perfect moment to launch his sprint, hitting out with 250 metres to go rather than waiting late.
Tiesj Benoot (Visma-Lease a Bike) tried to pre-empt the sprint but faded as Matthews came past. The Australian easily held off a charge from Girmay, who left his sprint too late, while Benoot was passed by Molard to miss the podium.
"I knew it was a hard day, so I guess no one really had a real kick left in their sprint," Matthews said. "So when the bunch all moved to the left, I saw an opportunity to open up my sprint on the right. And I guess no one had probably expected someone to go from that early.
"I knew I didn't have the peak power today, but I have a really long sprint, and I knew I had the power to do a 15 to 20 second sprint today."
Matthews went overlooked somewhat in the build-up to the race in Québec with Pogačar on the line, but wasn't bothered by the lack of attention.
"Tadej is the number-one cyclist in the world at the moment. He's done some things this year that we've never seen in cycling before, so I totally understand that. I'm a fan of him, also. So when he comes to Canada, it's not so often, and I understand that the fans love him, and he's great for the sport. For me, I'm just here to do my job, which is to win the race. It doesn't matter how many interviews I have as long as long as I win the race."
It's the first win since January for Matthews who claimed second in Milan-San Remo and was third in the Tour of Flanders until he was relegated for irregular sprinting.
"I had a really good start to the year, but since Flanders, with my disqualification in that sprint, my head rolled off a little bit, honestly, with the Tour de France and the Olympics, I was trying to make up for for that unfortunate relegation. To bounce back here with the lead up to the world championships with a win in Québec, it's incredible.
Matthews dedicated the victory to his grandmother, who passed away last week. "Her funeral was this Wednesday in Canberra in Australia. So this victory is for her."
How it unfolded
Beautiful sunshine and big crowds welcomed the 168 starters to the sign-on in Parc de la Francophonie, with the biggest cheers coming for home talent Derek Gee (Israel-Premier Tech), two-time World Champion Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep) and, of course, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates).
Riders took the start at 11 am local time on the Grande Allée Ouest as they headed for the first of 16 laps around the testing 12.6km urban circuit, totalling a distance of 201.6km.
Quickly the break of the day started to form and it was filled with young riders, as Jonas Walton, Félix Hame (Canada), Filippo Ridolfo and Antonio Polga (Novo-Nordisk) got the move started, only to be joined by two more young prospects from the WorldTour, Frank van den Broek (DSM-Firmenich PostNL) and Artem Shmidt (Ineos Grenadiers).
Polga dropped after they completed the first lap and the five remaining riders built up a 4:30 lead on the Intermarché-Wanty and Lotto Dstny-led peloton, who were working for Biniam Girmay and Arnaud De Lie respectively. Ridolfo then joined his teammate Polga off the back of the break after his time in front, getting dropped on lap four.
Great crowds welcomed the riders as they rode past key parts of the city, notably the Parc des Champs-de-Bataille, the Plaines d'Abraham and of course the famous Fairmont Le Château Frontenac, one of Québec's most recognisable landmarks.
With the four men in front building their lead past the five-minute mark, the riders may have even got a chance to take in some of the stunning architecture through the Old Québec City before riding up the brutish 10% Côte de la Montagne ramp several times en route to the Grand Alleé finish, each lap building the anticipation more than the previous.
Shmit and Van den Broek proved to be the longest as the laps took their toll on Walton, who dropped on the seventh ascent out of the old city, leaving just three in front with nine laps to go at the finish line, however, their gap remained at five minutes.
It stayed this way until the race reached the 75km to-go mark and Hamel's time in front also ended, leaving only the young WorldTour riders Shmidt and Van den Broek in the lead with a 4:40 advantage.
Ben Healy (EF Educatinon-EasyPost) really got the action started, however, launching the first big attack with 62.2km to go, bringning a group of riders with him. This, alongside UAE Team Emirates getting on the front, neutralised the racing momentarily over the 11th crossing of the finish line.
UAE then showed themselves fully with 51.1km to go on the Côte de la Montagne ascent, putting several riders into difficulty on the steep slopes with Lotto Dstny closely following them. Pogačar's troops continued their assault of the course through Domen Novak, reducing the break's advantage down to under four minutes when they crossed the finish line four laps away from the finale.
Several other teams took stints on the front but the white jerseys of UAE returned with 3 laps to go, and it was again Novak who paced the climbs towards the end of the 14th rep, with Jan Tratnik (Visma-Lease a Bike) closely following, before leaving it to Rafał Majka with 26km to go.
The break began to falter at this point with their gap dropping to 1:20 as Alex Baudin (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) and Gil Gelders (Soudal-QuickStep) counterattacked before the end of the lap, gaining 15 seconds quickly from the peloton.
Tratnik and Pogačar led the peloton up the penultimate ascent of the Côte de le Montagne, sweeping up Baudin and Gelders in the process, while also reducing Shmidt and Van den Broek's lead to a miniscule 10 seconds with 15km still to ride.
UAE Team Emirates lit up the race with Tim Wellens making a move first but he only succeeded in lining out the peloton. A brief slowing with 10.5km to go inspired Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike) to launch an attack that seemed more promising, gaining 20 seconds on the bunch.
However, Lotto Dstny had other ideas and took up the chase, inspiring Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe and Lidl-Trek to pitch in to bring the American back.
Jorgenson still had a few seconds coming into 3.5km to go when Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-Quickstep) attacked out of the peloton with Maxim van Gils (Lotto Dstny), pulling away a group of six riders including Pogačar and De Lie. Alaphilippe kicked again but Pogačar had his number.
The Tour de France champion surged but when he saw that De Lie held onto his wheel, he eased up, letting two of De Lie's teammates rejoin.
Van Gils and Jenno Berckmoes led into the final climb but the entire peloton came back up to the group.
Matthews benefitted from the ploy and followed the Bahrain Victorious train to the 150 metre mark and surged to a fourth victory.
Results
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