European Championships 2019

The road

At the start

A minute's silence, then a flat circuit

The riders stand in Alkmaar for a minute's silence for Bjorg Lambrecht, killed at the Tour de Pologne days earlier, then set off into a stiff North Sea wind. This is the flattest course the young championship has had — an 11.5-kilometre circuit, 133 metres of climbing all day — and on paper it belongs to the sprinters. Italy defend with Trentin and bring Viviani besides; Spain have sent no elite men's team at all.

How it was won

1. 1147 km to go

   The wind makes the first cut

   Out of Alkmaar the road turns south into a North Sea gale and the bunch simply comes apart — six echelons strung across the polder inside the opening hour. Belgium lose their national champion, Tim Merlier, to a puncture on the wrong side of the split.

2. 270 km to go

   Italy light the fuse

   With just under seventy kilometres left the Azzurri stop pacing and start racing, using the circuit's blind corners to draw the bunch out into a line. Trentin twists the knife, and when the elastic goes thirteen riders are clear with four Italians among them.

3. 325 km to go

   A tight bend makes it three

   Two laps and a little remain when one of the many corners does what the chase could not. Viviani, on the front, looks round and finds only Lampaert and Ackermann still there; the three improvise, commit, and ride away from the other ten.

4. 45 km to go

   Van Baarle rides himself empty

   The Dutch chase is down to one man. Dylan Van Baarle hauls the gap back to eighteen seconds with five kilometres to go and then there is nothing left in him. He peels off, Ackermann's German teammates inherit the front and stop pedalling, and the medals belong to the three up the road.

5. 54 km to go

   Lampaert goes, Viviani reads him

   Three and a half kilometres out Lampaert knows exactly what a sprint against these two is worth, and launches from the back of the group with everything he has. Viviani slots in behind Ackermann to make the German do the chasing — then looks at the grimace that has been on that face for two laps, decides it is no bluff, and jumps. He is across in seconds, and takes one cursory turn on the late cobbled sector to be sure Ackermann never comes back.

6. 6At the line

   Viviani takes the stars

   Lampaert leads into the home straight because there is nothing else left to try. Viviani opens his sprint, his own Deceuninck-QuickStep teammate sits up in resignation, and the Italian rides the last metres upright and grinning — European champion off a breakaway, on a day he came to win a bunch sprint.

The result