Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers) secured the victory in the race against the clock at Chrono des Nations in Les Herbiers, France.
The British and European champion covered the 45.43km course with the fastest time of 52:02, beating World Champion Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) by 13 seconds.
Tarling and Evenepoel were the only two riders to average above 52km/h.
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Third place on the day went to Stefan Bissegger (EF Education-EasyPost), who finished at 1:10 behind Tarling.
The early best time at the first intermediate checkpoint was set by promising young Belgian TT specialist Alec Segaert (Lotto-Dstny), only for Mikkel Bjerg (UAE Team Emirates), French National TT Champion Rémi Cavagna (Soudal-QuickStep) and Bisseger to go better.
However, with Tarling the only rider to go under 13 minutes at that checkpoint and Evenepoel just 10 seconds back, it was clear that, barring major incidents, the World and European time trial champions were set to battle for the top spot of the day.
A winner of the junior edition of the same race in 2022 and a bronze medallist in the Worlds in Glasgow, Tarling subsequently proved to be the fastest in each of the checkpoints, pushing his initial advantage to 17 seconds at the second intermediate split and then maintaining his consistency all the way to the finish.
Evenepoel had to settle for second in his last race of the season, a week after he had finished ninth in Il Lombardia following an early crash.
“I couldn't go faster, so I don't want to make too many excuses. It went smoothly, but Tarling was slightly better,” Evenepoel told Het Laatste Nieuws.
“I started quickly, but so did Tarling. He held his lead until the finish, so that start made the difference. I came a little closer to the finish in that last part.”
“I was fighting against the wind, and riders weighing 80 kilos do that slightly better while I get pushed from left to right.”
Evenepoel said his crash and injuries incurred at Il Lombardia had not helped but that overall, he said, “it probably didn’t make a difference.”
“I did my best; the season is over. And 50 minutes of going flat out on a difficult course was a nice way to end it.”
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