First win as world champion for Alaphilippe in De Brabantse Pijl

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World champion Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep) won the 2020 Brabantse Pijl on Wednesday – his first victory in the rainbow stripes.

For a moment, it looked as though the Frenchman might have made the same mistake as three days ago at Liege-Bastogne-Liege, as he stopped halfway through celebrating over the finish line, fearing that Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Felix) had pipped him at the line.

But a photo finish confirmed that the victory was Alaphilippe's, with a boxed-in Van der Poel in second and Benoit Cosnefroy (AG2R La Mondiale) third in a three-man sprint.

The three riders had broken clear on the cobbled Moskesstraat climb, 11km from the finish, following a hectic, action-packed day of racing.

Alaphilippe had been the main instigator throughout the race and had already broken clear with Van der Poel on several occasions over the route's many climbs.

Each time, however, the duo was joined by other determined riders who dug deep to rejoin on the sections between the climbs, until the decisive move was made on the Moskesstraat.

Asked whether he saw victory today as retribution for what happened on Sunday, Alaphilippe insisted that "It is never revenge. I was really happy to be at the start here. I just wanted to give my best and enjoy my jersey. I raced it like I like, and I'm really happy to win.

"It's a really nice feeling [to win in the rainbow jersey]. Even to wear in the morning is something special. So to take the victory is amazing."

How it unfolded

A group of six riders broke clear at the start of the day. They were: Clement Chevrier (AG2R La Mondiale), Juraj Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe), Michael Storer (Sunweb), Mattias Skjelmose Jensen (Trek-Segafredo), Thomas Sprengers (Sport Vlaanderen-Baloise) and Andrea Peron (Novo Nordisk)

They were allowed a gap of over five minutes by the peloton, with Deceuninck-QuickStep doing much of the pace-setting during a steady and uneventful first two-thirds of the race.

That gap steadily decreased and stood at 2 minutes by the time the riders crossed the finishing circuit's finish line for the third to last time, with 65km left to ride.

The action kicked off in earnest on the second of four ascents of Hertstraat, 60km from the finish, when Zdenek Stybar (Deceuninck-QuickStep) upped the pace with teammate Julian Alaphilippe on his wheel. Alaphilippe then accelerated himself, bringing just five riders with him, including the Ineos Grenadiers duo of Michal Kwiatkowski and Luke Rowe.

It looked like a promising group, but the momentum sagged when a few riders, including Mathieu van der Poel, bridged up to it, and the peloton shortly brought them all back in.

Bora-Hansgrohe were intent on making the race difficult, firing up first Lennard Kamna (54km from the finish) then Marcus Burghardt (46km from the finish), but each attack ended in regroupment.

Burghardt was again involved in the next attack to go up the road 42km from the finish, along with Tosh Van der Sande (Lotto-Soudal) and Laurens Huys (Bingoal-Wallonie Bruxelles). They quickly caught the four remaining riders from the early break, then broke clear of them on the penultimate ascent of the Hertstraat to form a new leading trio.

Their time at the front was also short-lived, however, as Stybar again set a ferocious pace up the first ascent of Moskesstraat, summited 34km from the finish. Alaphilippe once again sat on his wheel and was joined this time by Van der Poel, who himself accelerated towards the top of the climb to drop Stybar.

That left Alaphilippe and Van der Poel, the two pre-race favourites, at the front of the race, and the two decided to work together and commit. Tim Wellens (Lotto-Soudal) attempted to bridge up to them but was unable to, after which a three-man chase group formed consisting of Sonny Colbrelli (Bahrain-McLaren), Omar Fraile (Astana) and Benoit Cosnefroy (Ag2r La Mondiale). After dangling for a little while at ten seconds behind, they joined the leading duo with 27km left to ride.

Five became six when Kwiatkowski put in an attack to join the leaders on the climb of  Schavei, capitalising on a huge turn at the front of the peloton from his teammate Luke Rowe.

The group continued to swell on the next climb of the Hagaard, as several more riders from the peloton made the gap. Subsequently, 13 riders were together at the base of the last time up the Hertstraat, on which Alaphilippe made another attack, with Van der Poel again following. They were later joined by Cosnefroy, Kwiatkowski, Colbrelli, Dries Devenyns (Deceuninck-QuickStep) and Alessandro Covi (UAE Emirates).

Alaphilippe continued to be the instigator, putting in several more digs, eventually dropping everyone but Van der Poel and Cosnefroy on the Moskesstraet.

At last, after multiple attacks and a continually fluctuating race situation, the decisive group had formed and would stay together until the sprint at the finish. Cosnefroy was the first to launch his sprint, just over 200 metres from the line, but Alaphilippe comfortably overtook him for victory, with Van der Poel finding himself boxed-in between the two.