Results U23 Men's 2025 World Championships Road Race | Lorenzo Finn (18) takes incredible solo win for second world title in as many years

Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe's 18-year-old Italian wonderkid Lorenzo Finn has backed up the junior world title he took in Zurich last year with a stunning U23 World Championship win in Kigali this Friday afternoon.

The race in Kigali quickly became a battle of attrition, with the relentless Rwandan circuit and searing pace forcing abandonments from the very first laps. An early three-man breakaway formed before the first passage of the line, featuring Michal Pomorski (Poland), Danylo Kozoriz (Ukraine), and Ramazan Yilmaz (Turkey). They held a modest lead of 24 seconds, but the peloton, still largely intact, brought them back one by one, with Kozoriz the last to be caught at 142 km to go.

As the laps ticked by, the peloton steadily thinned. Riders from the UAE, Thailand, Turkey, Seychelles, and Slovakia were among the early casualties. After the fourth lap, 77 riders remained, with Kozoriz among those to abandon following his time in the break.

Belgium began to dictate terms, upping the tempo to fracture the race further. The likes of Mauro Brenner (Germany) and others were dropped or abandoned as the pressure mounted through the middle phase of the race. Short-lived attacks by Pietro Mattio (Italy) and Jasper Schoofs (Belgium) were quickly neutralised around 78 km from the finish.

With 62 kilometres remaining, Héctor Álvarez of Spain launched the most promising move of the day. Attacking solo, he carved out a small gap, with Belgian talent Jarno Widar reacting immediately in an attempt to close it down. The peloton followed just five seconds behind. It didn't take long for Álvarez’s move to blow the race apart. The Spaniard continued alone at the front, with a strong chase group behind, now 30 seconds adrift into the final 55km.

As the pace continued to be relentless and the attacks kept firing off the front of the chase, by the time the race entered the last 45km of the day, Alvarez had been joined at the front by five more riders, including Italian wonderkid Lorenzo Finn, with the group dangling around 20 seconds clear of the remainder of the peloton.

With just over 30km to go, and the cohesion in the lead group starting to fall apart, Finn decided the time was right to go for glory himself, kicking clear over the top of the Côte de Kimihurura. As the final lap began at around 15km to go, Finn, who had been joined by Swiss Jan Huber, held a 47 second lead over their nearest chasers, with the pre-race favourites of Maxime Decomble, Adria Pericas, Jakub Ormzel and Jarno Widar in another group nearly two minutes down on the front. 

Finn and Huber were looking increasingly good for the gold and silver, but inside the final 10km, the cooperation was starting to stop between the pair as they shared some vociferous words and hand signals on numerous occasions. With 6.5km to go, Finn attacked again, leaving Huber behind and riding clear solo. That proved the decisive move too, as the Italian powered clear to the world title. Behind Finn, Huber took the silver, with Austria's Marco Schrettl grabbing bronze.