Sunday, Oct. 12, 2003

 By Kris Westwood

 After 260 kilometres and six and a half hours of racing, the elite men's road cycling world championships were decided in the final 12 kilometres of racing today.

 As the 180 competitors from 35 countries lined up to start this morning, they faced a hard day's racing that would include 42 climbs of the Niagara escarpment on the over 21 laps of racing on the downtown Hamilton course.

 Everything pointed to a race of attrition, with only a handful of riders in contention on the closing laps. Instead, an Italian team determined to keep the race in control for pre-race favourite Paolo Bettini, allied with a strong headwind on the final climb, conspired to produce an event with more than 60 riders in the hunt with a lap to go.

 It wasn't for lack of breakaway attempts: early moves included a six-lap breakaway by Koos Moerenhout of Netherlands in the first half of the race. But, as Moerenhout was joined by Victor Hugo Pena of Colombia and BjAPrnar VestAPl of Norway and the break's lead grew to three minutes, the Italian team decided enough was enough and began to chase. Within a lap and a half, the break was caught.

 Several attacks followed, but none of them gained more than 45 seconds before the Azzurri brought them back, and as the pack reached the first climb on the final lap everything was together.

 Belgian team leader Van Petegem chose this moment to make his move, attacking hard up the right side of the road with Bettini, Spaniard Igor Astarloa, Michael Boogerd of the Netherlands, Bo Hamburger of Denmark and former world champion Oscar Camenzind of Switzerland on his wheel.

 As this group sped away to a 25-second lead, the German team began a desperate chase in an effort to set up their leader, Erik Zabel, for the win.

 It wasn't quite enough. The break had only 15 seconds at the base of the Claremont Access climb, but Astarloa sensed it was time and launched the decisive move.

 "We were sizing each other up and the peloton was approaching,aO* he said after the race. "I decided to attack. I knew it was going to be difficult because there was a headwind (on the climb)."

 As Astarloa sped away, rounding the bend at the top of the climb with 10 seconds in hand, Canadian Michael Barry jumped across from the closing pack with Alejandro Valverde Belmonte of Spain on his wheel.

 "I've done a lot of races where I cana't sleep the night after because I regret not attacking, so I thought I would just give it a go and see what happens" said Barry. "Three years ago, Steve Bauer, who designed this course, said that whoever comes over the top of the climb with ten seconds, they've pretty much won the race. Chances were slim (to catch Astarloa)."

 Bauer was right: Astarloa held on to his lead and cruised across the line with his hands raised in victory. Valverde Belmonte outsprinted Van Petegem for silver, and Barry came across the line in seventh, the best Canadian result at the elite men's worlds since Bauer's bronze in 1984.

 "Incredible" said Barry, 27, who grew up in Toronto but now lives in Colorado. "What happened today was a dream come true - to race the world championships in Canada and have so many people out there cheering for us"

 In fact, 104,000 fans came out to watch the racing, bringing the total spectator count for the six days of racing to 230,000.