Evenepoel crushes field and overtakes Pogacar to claim third TT world title

The day was finally here, and it was time for Remco Evenepoel to defend his individual time trial rainbow jersey in the land of the thousand hills, Kigali, Rwanda. 

The course was a monster for a time trial, with the 40.6 kilometre course taking in 681 metres of elevation, with three intermediate time checks out on the course.

Beginning the day, it was a real festival atmosphere in the Rwandan capital with adoring fans cheering on the first rider of the day, Rwandan Shemu Nsengiyumva, with scenes that could have inspired the next generation of African riders.

The first real benchmark of the day was set by the Belgian Florian Veermeesch, who put in a time of 54.49 and an average speed across the tough course of 44.4 km/h.

Canadian Michael Leonard then went quicker by a significant margin over Vermeersch, by over a minute and moved into the hotseat before the protagonists were set for launch, later in the afternoon.

The battle for rainbow really got underway shortly after, with a number of strong TT specialists getting underway, including Isaac del Toro, Jay Vine and then the big two of Remco Evenepoel and Tadej Pogačar.

In a completely unbelievable fashion, Remco Evenepoel produced an individual performance of the ages, reaching super sonic speeds on the Kigali course, whilst Pogačar was struggling in accordance with his elite standards.

To put into context just how supersonic Evenepoel was flying, he was 1:17 quicker than Jay Vine through the intermediate time check 2, with an average speed of 47.4 km/h over the lumps and bumps of the course.

Evenepoel started two and a half minutes down on Pogačar and even managed to overtake Pogačar on the course to the delight of the well-travelled Belgian fans.

Running out of superlatives for Remco Evenepoel, he managed to complete a famed hat-trick, becoming the latest rider since Tony Martin to complete the three in a row.

Evenepoel's time was 40.47 and an average speed of 48.9km/h, he was followed home by Jay Vine in 2nd and Ilan Van Wilder in 3rd.