Here’s William Fotheringham’s report on a historic day in Zurich.

Taking to the stage to receive their medals. First Mathieu van der Poel, then silver for Ben O’Connor and then gold and the rainbow jersey to Tadej Pogacar.

Tadej Pogacar speaks: “I cannot believe what just happened. I put a lot of pressure on myself. The race unfolded pretty quick. I maybe did a stupid attack and Jan was with me. We had plans to keep the race under control but he race went quite early. I don’t know what I was thinkimg. After a perfect season it was a really big goal, and I can’t believe it happeend. I’m super proud of my national team. Yeah. Let’s go.”

Pogacar dumps his bike and makes straight for his girlfriend, Urska Zigart. Van der Poel is only too happy to offer his congratulations. Remco Evenepoel, who came fifth, has a big smile too. Everyone knows the best man won that one.

Australia’s Ben O’Connor takes second, having at last dropped the chasing pack. And Van der Poel, last season’s winner, leads them over to take third.

1km to go: the flamme rouge, just 1000m to history.

2km to go: Healy goes on the attack in search of the silver medal. Next goes Ben O’Connor.

3km to go: Back down to the shoreside and Pogacar knows that only a mechanical or a Devon Loch can stop him.

4km to go: No doubt now, surely. Pogacar has run the finish out of his chasers. And they have taken to turning on each other.

5km to go: A slight incline – and Hirschi puts in one last dig. So does Healy. Remco’s off the back. Healy leads the chase but cannot lose the wheel. Skujins next to have a go., The excitement lies within this group.

8km to go: Panic over? Not in the chasing pack. Van der Poel has decided he wants silver at very least. Evenepoel looks to be done. Pogacar meanwhile uses the descent as hang time. The pack is just too tired after what he took out of them for the 80km between 100km and 20km out.

10km to go: The gap is 450m, dropping down. Are they going to catch him? They might just be, you know. Pogacar takes notice as the neutral car sets off, meaning he is under threat. He holds the gap at 40 seconds. He’s still ripping along at 55km/h but is in danger as he begins a descent. The chasers try to burn each other off, but nobody can get clear. The road is narrowing. The gap goes back out.

15km: Will this chasing group work with each other? It seems unlikely.

16km to go: Enric Mas, the Spaniard, chases down Marc Hirschi, the Swiss. The gap is dropping – it’s 42 – but it’s a big group of favourites behind him. Van der Poel and Evenepoel are chasing, as are Mas and Hirschi. He’s done the hard part, the climb.

20km to go: The final climb, and Pogacar is the best climber of the lot, being roared along by a passionate Swiss crowd. Skujins is putting Healy under, and suddenly Hirschi sets off after the chasers. He gives the home crowd plenty to cheer about. Attacks all over the hill. Healy gets back on Skujins’ wheel, and the gap has dropped 10 seconds after that Skujins attack. A wobble? New hope for the chasers? This ain’t over? Fool if you think it’s over? The gap is 47 seconds. Then 48.

25km to go: Roman Bardet, who will sign off at next year’s Dauphine, is in his last ever world championship. He’s up with the chasing pack, taking his place among his peers.

30km to go: In other news: Ben Healy of Ireland, who had an excellent Olympics, making that wildcat attack on the Parisian streets, attempting a Pog, is riding himself into a podium position. He’s become well known as a stage racer, the lad who hails from Kingswinford.

36km to go: Red-hot live pics from Helenburgh’s finest. Pogacar is meanwhile happy with his dining options and forging on to the finish. Where’s Roglic? Seems he took a Sunday bike ride.

38km to go: The Slovenian team car makes its ways to their man, looks a little agitated. Has he missed a supply of something? Seems he missed a gel. The hunger knock is one to be feared when you hit the front at 100km.

42km to go: Pogacar has his hand in the air? A mechanical? No, seems he missed a bidon. Is that a cause for concern? Let’s see. Here’s what happened 50 years ago when Eddy Merckx was world champion. Pogacar is much a cannibal than Eddy ever was. Second that year: Raymond Poulidor – the grandfather of Van der Poel. It’s all connected.

45km to go: Pogacar has 50 seconds on Healy and Toms Skujins, with Van der Poel, the defending champion, giving vain chase but fancying a spot on the podium. He has 25 seconds on Evenepoel, who is 90 seconds down. It’s so brutal, breaking the best in the business, bit by bit. History beckons.

50km to go: Two laps to go: Pogacar and Sivakov past what will be the finishing line. Healy leads the chase with plucky Brit Oscar Onley and Toms Skujins of Latvia. Van der Poel and Evenepoel haven’t found the form to blow the others away. Evenepoel is asking for more help from the other chasers. But he’s not got the form. And up ahead, Pogacar drops Sivakov, the Frenchman unable to hold his wheel.

58km to go: Joe gets in touch: “This is completely suicidal stuff from any other cyclist. But not Pog. Would not surprise me to see him be reeled in by the peloton, and he just drops them all again on the climb. Monster.”

60km to go: Here we go then, it’s Pogacar and Sivakov, with Evenepoel, Van der Poel and Hirschi giving chase, in a group including Ireland’s Ben Healy. The gap is 40 seconds, and nobody is really working with each other beyond the two leaders. Jai Hindley, the Australian, is up there. Decimation from Pogacar.

70km to go: Evenepoel is up there, Nelson Powless, the American forges off alone, too. But Pogacar has created havoc and panic, almost certainly by design. He’s taking more seconds off the chasers, and suddenly Remco has had enough, and he goes off. Attack after attack, but the gap is 40 seconds between Pogacar and Sivakov ahead of the chasers. Each surviving nation appears to be having a dig. But Pogacar reigns supreme. Only Evenepoel looks capable of stopping him.

75km to go: They zip around the shoreline, and approach the climb. Tratnik is asked to up his output. Tratnik is dropped as soon as Pogacar goes off the front. Sivakov is looking strong. The front group otherwise reduced to stragglers, and that includes Sivakov who is dropped.

80km to go: In the peloton, Evenepoel, Van der Poel and a recovered Hirschi are all ready to swoop. Up in the lead group, Pavel Sivakov, who is in Pogacar’s UEA Team Emirates, is handily place. Three laps left in the race now.

85km to go: The Belgians giving chase but the gap is 53 seconds, around 600m of road.

90km to go: Pogacar and Tratnik ease into the leading group and go to the front, and as they reach a descent, he flies off at the front. The Belgian riders have pulled the the gap back to under a minute, to add a further plot twist. It may be that Pog is well clear by the time they catch up.

95km to go: Andrea Bagioli, the Italian cyclist, tried to go with Pogacar, but no luck. He was burned off, and Pogacar catches up with teamamate Tratnik, who had been up in those groups, and he will use his man as a windshield. He’s only 0.5km down on the leaders.

97 km to go: William Preston gets in touch: “When I was younger, I didn’t think much of the world championship road race. Coming from a mountain bike background, with those races being mostly a solitary endeavour, it seemed odd that the road side of the sport that focuses so much nowadays on having one team built around one rider mixes it up so much for one all or nothing tilt at the rainbow jersey.

“And then I realized the majesty of a a team thrown together, having to put contractual differences aside to get a stomp on and propel their rider first over the line. The thrilling heroics of it all hasn’t disappointed me since. It’s a wonderful thing. It’s way better than the Olympic road race, too, as it’s every year.”

Pogacar seems willing to pull the race along with him. Who needs teammates?

105km to go: The leading group looking backwards at the group charging towards him. The gap drops to 11 seconds, then 10. We all know what comes next. The gap to the peloton is three minutes. With a long time to go, the exciting bit.

110km to go: There’s been a split in the peloton, a decisive split? Some big hitters in there, and it will take the big riders a fair bit to get back up with them.

Laurens De Plus (Belgium), Jan Tratnik (Slovenia), Mattia Cattaneo (Italy), Magnus Cort (Denmark), Pavel Sivakov (France), Stephen Williams (Great Britain), Jay Vine (Australia), Kevin Vermaerke (USA), Johannes Staune-Mittet (Norway) and Florian Lipowitz (Germany) are those who have put the hammer down and are the chasers.

125km to go: A hole blown in the peloton as Pablo Castrillo, the Spanish cyclist who made a reputation for himself at the Vuelta, goes away. The Slovenians take up the chase, and end up losing two men in the chase. Evenepoel keeps in touch but there’s a few of his Belgian teammates behind. Mark Donovan from Team GB goes off too. Campanaerts resumes his engine role at the front of the group. Attack after attack.

130km to go: Five laps to go, with the steep climb beginning just past the finishing line. The peloton is shaped as if they are taking on a sprint. Sadly, no points for the intermediate here. The sun is looking hot, adding a variable that wasn’t available to riders in this week’s other races.

135km to go: This lap has seen something of an ease off, and the gap is nearly four minutes again. Pogacar is surrounded by teammates, and looks very relaxed.

140km to go: The sad sight of the two-time champion forced to abandon.

*Seems this is Roman Bardet.

145km to go: That Campanaert engine is keeping Remco Evenepoel in a good position at the front. The six men good and true continue to lead, their lead now below three minutes.

150km to go: Victor Campenaerts is pulling the race along. But Marc Hirschi, one of the minor favourites, is dropping off. He’s won races since, and a rider who came to the fore in 2020 was expected to be involved. This year and last he’s come back to form. A bit of mystery over what the trouble appears to be.

155km to go: The chocolate box backdrop to this race is full of punters, huge crowds out there. The favourites continue to be sat up, or lie low, whatever way you wish to describe. From experience, Switzerland is rarely this lively on a Sunday.

160km to go: There’s movement in the field, and the breakaway group may soon be on its last hurrahs. The gap is dropped down to three minutes or so: Silvan Dillier (Switzerland), Tobias Foss (Norway), Simon Geshke (Germany), Rui Oliveira (Portugal), Piotr Pekala (Poland), Luc Wirtgen (Luxembourg).

170km to go: Pogacar is looking to do the Giro-Tour-World triple, as done by Stephen Roche in 1987. Eddy Merckx did it in 1974, too. Annemiek van Vleuten did it in 2022, it should be noted.

Will Roglic do for Pogacar what Sean Kelly did here for Roche? Look at his celebration as his mate crosses the line.

180km to go: Bilbao, the Spanish rider, is up among the peloton as they climb the summit of an uphill section through the suburbs. Zurich is the type of place where nothing is really flat aside from in the centre.

190km to go: The gap from that bunch of rouleurs at the front to the peloton is 5’ 37”. So so long to go.

205km to go: That breakaway group has 1’36” on their chasers, and 4’15 on the peloton. It’s pretty relaxed out there. Michael Woods, the Canadian veteran, is taking on a bowl of pasta with a fork. Plenty of discussion in the peloton as they climb through a forested hill.

218km to go: There’s a crash at the side of the road. Pello Bilbao, of Spain, one of their leading contenders, comes down, waves his teammates on. That didn’t look too good.

220km to go: Reminder: there’s no race radios in the worlds. Primoz Roglic just stopped for a call of nature, and with no teammate near him. Presumably, someone knows where he’s got to.

225km to go: A tough climbing section, with attendant cowbells and that asks questions of the breakaway. Simon Geshke (Germany), Markus Pajur (Estonia)
and Roberto Gonzales (Panama) are in there, though Pajur really struggled to get on, and fails to do so. He and Gonzales are off the back, with still a great deal of the road back to the main group. Geshke is riding in his last ever worlds.

235km to go: We’ve completed a circuit. There’s plenty of ups and down in this race, and still so long to go. Anyone committing at this point must feel they are in the form of their life or is being used up by the big guns. It’s Silvan Dillier (Switzerland), Tobias Foss (Norway), Rui Oliveira (Portugal), Piotr Pekala (Poland), Luc Wirtgen (Luxembourg), with 13 seconds back to chasers and 1’ 21” back to the peloton.

245km to go: Into open country, and through some farmland and, yes, Swiss cottages. It’s a Norwegian and an Ecuadorian, Jonathan Caicedo. The Vatican City entrant is being spat well out the back, and needs snookers – and prayers - to finish. But here comes a serious move, and it includes Bardet, and two Belgians. Three Americans, too. The gentleman from Belize, Cory Williams, who we saw go off, is now struggling badly. It’s a large group. With Jan Tratnik of Slovenia in there. Belgium and Slovenia – the teams of the big players – are marking out their territory.

255 km to go: Poland, Portugal, USA and Latvia are the early break. The Qatari rider is way off the back; with the big boys now. The peloton behind them is huge. Then, when that drops back, another trio goes away. We’ve already seen Roman Bardet and Mikel Landa to the fore and nobody is being allowed to go – just yet. Estonia, a member of the refugee team – and Belize? Venezuela on the chase. It’s the United colours of Benetton in these early stages.

265km to go: The peloton makes its way down to Zurich through Schaffhausen. Lovely morning son, and fresh air too. The freshest it gets, Swiss air. In Europe, that is. Sad to say that the Honduran rider, Fredd Matute, who is 38, is out the back already. Long way to go, Fredd. Up at the front, no real pattern, though an American rider, Larry Warbasse is up in the vanguard.

There’s just under 5km to the real start. Plenty of chat between the riders. The skies feature smatters of blue, far better than what came earlier this week. The Rhine Falls is passed – not to be confused with the Reichenbach Falls? They are zipping along in this virtual start, warming up the legs.

On the start line, the Swiss team take central stage as remembrance is paid, a moment of silence for Muriel Furrer. Her family have said they want the race to go ahead.

Here’s what the course will look like.

“Every time you have to start from zero,” says Remco Evenepoel, looking to add this to his time trial rainbow jersey. And Olympic gold. “All types of riders can win it.”

“Today’s going to be a hard and long race,” says Pogacar, who has been on a recce of the course with Matt Stephens. “It’s good to have him as a teammate,” Pog says of Primoz Roglic, fellow Slovenian. Between them, they won all three Grand Tours. It seems he plans to attack on the steepest section and that comes after the finish line of the circuit. How many laps out will he go for it?