A women’s world championship road race for the ages was won by Lotte Kopecky, who survived everything a spiteful Zurich afternoon could throw at her to retain her rainbow jersey. On a day where the rain was incessant and temperatures struggled into double figures, the 28-year-old’s body felt frozen long before the end and she was dropped on the final climb as Demi Vollering pushed the pace.

But the Belgian was given a lifeline by some hesitation among the leaders, as well as some questionable tactics from the Dutch team, which enabled her to work back into contention as six riders headed to the finish at the Sechseläutenplatz.

When Australia’s Ruby Roseman-Gannon struck for glory, Kopecky had enough energy to jump on her wheel and push clear to take gold. Silver was won by Chloé Dygert, who produced the best finish by an American woman since Inga Thompson in 1991, with the Italian Elisa Longo Borghini claiming bronze.

Kopecky paid tribute to the 18-year-old Muriel Furrer, who died after a crash towards the end of the junior race on Thursday.

A minute’s silence was held before Saturday’s race, with many of the Swiss team in tears as they interlocked arms. Furrer’s family had expressed their wish that the World Championships should continue.

“First of all, I want to bring my condolences to the family of Muriel,” said Kopecky. “The minute of silence at the start, seeing the Swiss riders crying is just something you don’t want to see.”

Kopecky had been targeting this race since winning bronze in the road race at the Paris Olympics and skipped the Tour de France Femmes to focus on defending her crown. She said the weather and the succession of hills on the 154.1km course had made it as much of a mental as a physical battle.

“It was a really annoying day because it was raining, it was cold, but on the climbs it was warm, then on the downhills you got so cold,” she said. “Three laps from the end I was freezing but I tried to stay as cool as possible.

“I had some difficulties when Demi went on the final climb but I just tried to stay at my own pace and come back. At the end it was just a lot of mind games so I was just trying to stay as cool as possible and use my energy at the right moments.”

Before the race, Vollering, who won La Vuelta Femenina this year and is regarded as the best climber in the world, had promised fireworks and the race certainly delivered with numerous breakaways and attacks during just over four hours of action.

The lack of race radio meant neither riders or teams could be entirely sure what was going on. For large parts of the race the Dutch team looked to be in a strong position with Vollering and the three-time world champion Marianne Vos seeming comfortable. However it was not to be as Vollering lacked the sprint finish to get on the podium and Vos blew up in the final few kilometres.

“I am really disappointed that I couldn’t finish it off for the Dutch team,” said a shivering Vollering. “The last part was not really hard enough for me so maybe I should have gone earlier.”

The 37-year-old Vos said: “ It was very hard and at a certain point I was not in a good situation any more.”