Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates) secured the victory at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal after igniting a late-race two-rider breakaway on the final ascent of the circuit's decisive Côte Camillien-Houde on Mont-Royal.
Yates and breakaway rival Pavel Sivakov (Ineos Grenadiers) descended into the last kilometre along Avenue du Parc with a slim lead over a small chase group. Sivakov led the pair through the final U-turn, signifying 500 metres to go, but Yates launched his winning sprint on the uphill drag to the finish line, taking the victory.
Alex Aranburu (Movistar Team), who had jumped ahead of what was left of the main field, could not reconnect with the breakaway, but he managed to hang on for third place.
"The race is super hard. There are a lot of metres of climbing, and in the end, it's almost six hours. So it's a super-taxing day, and the guys did a good job to look after me. We started to wind it up with three or four laps to go. The guys did an amazing job of setting the pace high. I'm not super explosive, but I can do this heavy pace, so we knew if we could do this, we would have a better chance," said Yates, who finished second place in Montreal in 2015.
"On the last lap, I went full gas, so it was perfect. I've been trying [to win this race] for a few years now. I've had good memories. Pavel and I worked well together in the final, and I was happy he got second. All-in-all, a good day."
How it unfoldedThe peloton’s worst fears were realised before the start of the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal on Sunday. A hard rain fell over the Parc du Mont-Royal, and riders stood huddled beneath gazebos to shelter from the elements until the last possible moment. The words of the city’s most famous song came to mind. “I think of a pessimist as someone who is waiting for it to rain,” Leonard Cohen once said. “And I feel soaked to the skin.”
Once proceedings got underway, Florian Vermeersch (Lotto-Dstny) proved to be the most optimistic of the 159 starters, attacking alone ahead of the Côte Camillien-Houde on the first of 18 laps of the demanding circuit. Harrison Wood (Cofidis) and Manuele Boaro (Astana-Qazaqstan) later formed a counter-attack, but the duo was never able to get on terms with the lone leader, and they eventually receded into the bunch.
Vermeersch would doubtless have welcomed the company, but he proceeded to stick gamely to his task, amassing a lead of more than four minutes on a peloton that was initially policed by Israel Premier Tech. As ever, the sheer volume of climbing made this a race of attrition. The ascent of the Côte Camillien-Houde, Côte de Polytechnique and Pagnuelo on each lap add up to a total altitude gain of 4,832m. By the midway point, a sizeable portion of the peloton had climbed off, beaten by the conditions and the course.
Daryl Impey was among the abandons in his final race as a professional, with the South African putting in a long stint at the front on behalf of Israel Premier Tech teammates Michael Woods and Derek Gee before bidding farewell to the bunch with 70km or so remaining. At the start, meanwhile, the organisation had laid on a farewell gift for another retiring rider. Greg Van Avermaet (AG2R Citroën), winner of this race in 2019, was presented with a personalised Montréal Canadiens jersey when he went to sign-on.
Lidl-Trek and Groupama-FDJ joined Israel Premier Tech’s pace-making inside the final 80km, and Vermeersch’s advantage started to contract accordingly, dropping inside two minutes with six laps of the circuit remaining. Soudal-QuickStep came to the fore shortly afterwards, and Vermeersch’s buffer was sliced to 45 seconds with five laps to go, and he would be swept up with 55km remaining.
GP de Québec winner Arnaud De Lie (Lotto-Dstny) tested the waters with a speculative attempt with a shade over three laps remaining, but the endgame got underway in earnest on the ascent of Camillien-Houde, when a delegation from UAE Team Emirates, led by Rafal Majka, cut the front group down to 40 or so riders.
UAE continued their forcing the next time around on behalf of Adam Yates, with Brandon McNulty now prominent, and yet more riders were shaken loose on the penultimate time up Camillien-Houde, including Neilson Powless (EF Education-EasyPost), Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep) and Christophe Laporte (Jumbo-Visma).
McNulty would spend the bulk of the penultimate lap at the head of the race, driving the pace. Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) tried to forge clear on the climb of the Polytechnique, but McNulty’s grip on the race was total, and the move petered out shortly afterwards. Michael Matthews (Jayco-Alula) was the next to try his luck and anticipate the final lap, but McNulty and UAE remained in control of the situation.
Into the last ascent of the Côte Camillien-Houde, McNulty led UAE Team Emirates and what was left of the field onto the lower slopes, which served as a launch pad for teammate Adam Yates.
Pavel Sivakov (Ineos Grenadiers) was the only rider to follow Yates, but he was quickly distanced as Yates surged again just over the top of the ascent. Yates' lead extended to five seconds on the descent, but as he reached the flatter sections on the far side of the course, Sivakov managed to reconnect, and he immediately rode to the front, helping their gap grow to 15 seconds.
Along the circuit's second ascent, Côte de la Polytechnique, Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) jumped in pursuit of the breakaway, and other reactions came from Simone Velasco (Astana Qazaqstan) and Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ), but all were unsuccessful.
Yates and Sivakov held a steady pace over the Côte de Pagnuelo and began the descent down toward Avenue du Parc with seven seconds. Alex Aranburu (Movistar Team) tried to bridge the gap alone, while Velasco, Ben O'Connor (AG2R Citroën), and Simone Yates (Jayco AlUla) desperately tried to regain contact before the U-turn at 500 metres to go.
The pair of leaders exited the last turn with 12 seconds in hand, and Adam Yates started his sprint first, off of Sivakov's wheel. Clearly the strongest of the two, he opened a three-second gap on the way to the finish line, raising his arms with a late-season victory.
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