Ripping up the script written by the Dutch women in the past four world championships, the Italian Elisa Balsamo snatched the road race title from under the noses of a dominant Netherlands squad. One of the sport’s greatest of all time, Marianne Vos, finished in tears, less than a bike length behind after a gruelling 157km around Flanders.

Balsamo, the 2016 world junior champion, and the rest of the Italian team played a tactical blinder by lying low in the final 50km before the finish in Leuven as the Dutch squandered their strength in a constant series of fruitless moves – and other nations squandered theirs with constant responses – as the peloton was whittled down to a front group of about 25.