Noa Isidore (Decathlon CMA CGM) emerged victorious from a messy sprint at the 107th Coppa Bernocchi, taking victory from the bunch with a powerful kick in Legnano ahead of Tommaso Dati (Team UKYO).
The final run to the line was marred by a nasty crash with 700 metres to go, several riders including Ben Swift (Netcompany Ineos) coming down before the sprint was opened up.
As the split bunch ramped up in pace, Dorian Godon (Netcompany Ineos) and Matteo Trentin (Tudor) tried to storm into the slipstream of late attacker Gil Gelders (Soudal-QuickStep), only to be overhauled by those charging quickly behind them.
Isidore speared his way through the middle and past the fast-finishing Dati for the win, with Marijn van den Berg (EF Education EasyPost) taking third on Monday.
"It's a good finish for me. The goal today was to win, so I came here in Italy for that and I'm very happy," said Isidore after the finish, taking his third victory as a professional in his second year on Decathlon's WorldTour squad.
"I'm really happy this year I can be a leader sometimes with my team, and I proved I can win, so I'm happy for me and my teammates who worked for me.
"In the sprint, I just saw the guy from [UKYO], and I thought, 'Just push, push, push, push, you can do it', and I won, so it's good."
Three riders from the early breakaway survived all the way until 1.6k to go, with the charging bunch also bringing back a powerful chasing group that contained Jhonatan Narváez (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Neilson Powless (EF Education - EasyPost) inside 10km to go.
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It was Samuele Zoccarato (MBH Bank CSB Telecom Fort), Sergio Samitier (Cofidis), and Ben Granger (Solution Tech NIPPO Rali) who had made it into the finale from the break, but even with the Spaniard's undying efforts, they were unable to hold off the chase led mostly by Ineos, EF and Uno-X Mobility.
No team really had full control in the finale, though, which was true of the majority of the action near Milan, leading to several teams accelerating their leaders to the front, which played a role in the crash of Ben Swift and several others.
In fact, the race winner came dangerously close to being involved in the high-speed incident, as the rider who inadvertently caused Swift to lose balance, as he was squeezed by an EF rider, which caused a ripple effect in the bunch and saw more than six riders hit the deck hard next to the pavement.
"I think it's Filippo Ganna next to me," said Isidore, but it was actually Swift, wearing the number four dossard for Ineos, "and the guy from EF just pushed me and I couldn't do anything, so I hope Filippo is good now. But it's like that,"
Racing at the Italian Autum Classics will continue on Tuesday at Tre Valli Varesine, as the build up to Il Lombardia and the final Monument of the 2026 season this Saturday continues.
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James Moultrie is a gold-standard NCTJ journalist who joined Cyclingnews as a News Writer in 2023 after originally contributing as a freelancer for eight months, during which time he also wrote for Eurosport, Rouleur and Cycling Weekly. Prior to joining the team he reported on races such as Paris-Roubaix and the Giro d’Italia Donne for Eurosport and has interviewed some of the sport’s top riders in Chloé Dygert, Lizzie Deignan and Wout van Aert. Outside of cycling, he spends the majority of his time watching other sports – rugby, football, cricket, and American Football to name a few.
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