Milan-San Remo 2020

The road

At the start

The Capi gone, 305km to San Remo

La Primavera in high summer: thirty degrees, a finish at half past six, teams of six not seven. A fortnight ago the mayors of the Ligurian coast refused to close their roads, so the road to San Remo was redrawn inland — 305 kilometres, the Capi gone and two long shallow passes in their place. Julian Alaphilippe returns as champion, Wout van Aert won Strade Bianche a week ago, and the sprinters wait for the Via Roma.

How it was won

1. 170 km to go

   Over the second false Turchino

   The day’s second false Turchino, after Niella Belbo: 936 metres of altitude taken at 1 to 2%, a climb only in the sense that the road tilts. Jumbo-Visma, Groupama-FDJ, Lotto Soudal and Deceuninck grind at the front and the break's lead falls under two minutes.

2. 225 km to go

   Alaphilippe's mechanical

   Twenty-five kilometres out, on the flat, dead-fast road to the Cipressa, the defending champion drops back to the cars with a mechanical. He gets it fixed and threads his way forward again, but the peloton is already accelerating without him.

3. 322 km to go

   Cipressa

   Loïc Vliegen and Jacopo Mosca jump away at the foot and Bora-Hansgrohe simply ride them back in sight of the top. Behind, the sprinters are being posted: Caleb Ewan and Fernando Gaviria are out the back and out of Milan-San Remo.

4. 49 km to go

   Oss almost steals it

   Daniel Oss dives off the Cipressa so hard he comes out the bottom alone, and holds the gap all the way along the seafront with Jungels fifteen seconds back and closing. He is caught metres before the Poggio begins.

5. 57 km to go

   Alaphilippe fires on the Poggio

   Six and a half kilometres from the Via Roma, on the steepest pitch of a climb that averages barely 3.7%, Julian Alaphilippe stands on the pedals and the race tears apart behind him. One man goes with him. Wout van Aert, a cyclo-cross world champion still without a Monument, does not so much follow as refuse to let go.

6. 66 km to go

   Alone over the top, together at the bottom

   Alaphilippe crests the Poggio on his own, Van Aert trailing by a bike length and a bad moment. Down the hairpins into San Remo the Belgian claws it back, and by the seafront the two of them are clear with ten seconds on a strung-out chase.

7. 7At the line

   Via Roma

   Nobody comes from behind. Van Aert leads it out from the front, the worst place to be in a two-up sprint, and holds Alaphilippe off by half a wheel — a first Monument, at the end of a 305-kilometre day.

The result