The five-rider group first built a gap of 6 minutes before Denmark and the Netherlands started controlling. Then they stopped and the gap grew to a whole 15 minutes. Another group of four riders including Ryan Mullen, Elia Viviani, Gleb Syritsa and Georgios Bouglas also got a few minutes of lead.
Eventually the two groups merged in front and began to lose riders at the same time... Whilst behind Tiesj Benoot of Belgium joined the chase so that the big three teams were all putting in the effort to close the gap. In the final 100 kilometers, 92 more specifically, the action finally started in the peloton. Late but in time for a lot of explosivity... Ben Healy, Derek Gee and others were among the attackers that were stretching out the peloton and forcing some tactical choices for the big teams.
Healy and Alexey Lutsenko got a gap over the peloton in one of the climbs and then linked up with Ryan Mullen, the last survivor of the breakaway, who supported them for a few kilometers. Belgium put in a few stints that did some damage in the peloton behind on the climbs. Remco Evenepoel also attacked but was swiftly covered by his main rivals who were alive to the danger.
With around 60 kilometers to go the front duo began to be chased by a strong chasing group featuring
Valentin Madouas, Fred Wright, Stefan Küng, Nils Politt, Marco Haller, Michael Woods and Jambaljamts Sainbayar. Entering the final circuit in Paris the front duo (soon to just be Healy in the lead) had over a minute on the peloton and half a minute on the chasing group.
Van der Poel attacked the first time up the cobbled climb in the circuit, matched only by Wout van Aert. Julian Alaphilippe, Toms Skujins and Matteo Jorgenson joined and formed a small group but without ideal collaboration they were caught by chasers. With 38 kilometers to go Mads Pedersen bridged across with a few riders in the wheel and Remco Evenepoel launched his winning attack, getting a gap right away over the main favourites, catching the chasing group soon after.
Dylan van Baarle began the chase for the Netherlands and the second time up the climb van der Poel attacked with van Aert again in the wheel, but was caught in a Belgian trap. Evenepoel had in the meantime caught Healy and dropped everyone in his group besides Madouas. But with 15 kilometers to go the Belgian's pace was simply too hard for anyone else and he went solo off the front. With 4 kilometers to go he punctured, a very dramatic and stressful moment as he with no radio he did not know the gap to his rivals behind. But the victory was safe.
Behind Madouas secured a second place that earned him a strong silver medal whilst compatriot
Christophe Laporte sprinted to third from the chasing group getting the last medal.