Neilson Powless holds off the chase to take dramatic Gran Piemonte 2024 victory solo

EF Education-EasyPost's Neilson Powless has taken a dramatic solo victory at the 2024 Gran Piemonte, narrowly holding off the chase in a thrilling finale to the final tune up race ahead of Il Lombardia.

Four riders got themselves up the road to form the day's early breakaway, those being Andrii Ponomar, Nickolas Zukowsky, Francisco Muñoz and Luca Colnaghi. As they reached the foot of the day's biggest climb at around 70km to go, their advantage had been built up to around four minutes. As the descent began though, just Zukowsky and Muñoz were left at the front, now just only a minute clear and at 45km to go, things came mostly back together.

Not everyone was in the lead group of around 20 riders though. Big names such as Giulio Ciccone, Neilson Powless, Tom Pidcock, Alex Aranburu and Matej Mohoric were present though. The first real attack from the group came from Powless too, building a 37 second lead at 30km to go.

Despite the fact there was a sizeable group behind the lone leader, Powless continued to hold the gap pretty well and after the chase was disrupted further by a crash taking out two Lidl-Trek domestiques, the American entered the final lap of around 11km leading by 38 seconds. At 5km to go, it was down to 17 seconds, but he still dangled out in front.

In the chase group behind, Thymen Arensman was on the front, working in the service of INEOS Grenadiers' leader Tom Pidcock but all the Dutchman could do was hold the gap steady rather than cut any time away from Powless. Through the Flamme Rouge, he was in sight at 16 seconds but still just out of reach of the chasers and despite the best work of those behind it was victory for the American as Corbin Strong led home the chasing pack.