Zdenek Stybar darted off, as soon as the start gun went off, and managed to put a 20 sec gap between him and the chasing group.

Niels Albert managed to pull away from the chasing group that consisted of Kevin Pauwels, Klaas Vantornout and Sven Nys, who was able to make his way to the front of field, despite the fact that he started the race from the sixth line.

By the fourth lap, Albert took over the lead, whilst Stybar was unable to keep up with the current World Champion’s pace.

Nys and Pauwels chases Albert

The camera guy snapped some pictures when he wasn’t supposed to cover things with his big camera.

Wherever Stybar rode, the local crowd went berserk, they created an amazing atmosphere. At this point in the race, the gap wasn’t more than 10 sec between Albert and his chasers, so he kept checking how far behind they were.

Nys, Stybar and Pauwels were quite close indeed.

The contents of the chasing group were changing constantly, sometimes it was Stybar who had to work hard to catch up; in this lap it was Pauwels who had problems to keep up with Stybar and Nys. Nys seemed to be pretty strong, he left his Treviso-form way behind.

Great champions tend to win with grace and ease but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. They have their fair share of suffering.

Albert starts his last lap. The gap was above 35 sec now and he didn’t seem to slow down, at all.

The chasing group starts it last lap. It consists of Stybar, Nys, Pauwels and Frenchman Francis Mourey.

No matter how hard the chasing group put the hammer down, Niels Albert was the fastest again.

Champions are allowed to make funny faces.

Stybar led the chasing group to the final sprint but he was unable to outpower Nys, so not long before the finish line he gave up and let Nys take the silver medal.

Niels Albert, interviewed by the press.

Albert’s bike and some fans.

I wanted to snap a couple frames at the press conference, however, I didn’t take into consideration the effects of coming in from the cold had on my lenses. They were covered with a layer of fog which rendered them basically useless for the next 20 minutes.