The winning squad, led by American star Tejay van Garderen  stopped the clock on a rolling 57.1 kilometre course around the Spanish in a time of 1 hour, 03min 29sec.

That was 32 seconds faster than runners-up Orica-GreenEdge and 36 ahead of third-placed defending champions Omega Pharma-Quick Step. 

American-based BMC had a gold medal in this event for professional trade teams narrowly snatched away from them in 2012 but on this occasion they did not have such worries. 

"It feels incredible," said van Garderen, who raced alongside Australian Rohan Dennis, Swiss Silvan Dillier, fellow American Daniel Oss, Italian Manuel Quinziato and Slovakian Peter Velits.

"The team was confident, but we were nervous coming into this.

"A couple of years ago, in 2012, we were two seconds off the win, so we have had that in the back of our minds for a couple of years now.

"We knew coming in that we had a strong team.

"It was just a matter of everything falling into place.

"We went out there, did our thing, stayed calm, and we delivered."

Specialized-Lululemon celebrate their victory in the women's team time trial, the third consecutive year the American-based squad have won the world title ©Getty Images



In the women's team time trial, another United States-based team, Specialized-Lululemon claimed victory for the third year in a row with a dominant performance.

The squad of Americans Evelyn Stevens and Carmen Small, Germans Trixi Worrack and Lisa Brennauer, Dutchwoman Chantal Blaak and Canadian Karol-Ann Canuel negotiated the 36.1km course in a time of 43min 33sec.

That left them 77 seconds ahead of second-placed Orica-AIS and 2:19 quicker than bronze medallists Astana BePink.

Dutch team Rabo-Liv saw their hopes collapse in a spectacular crash in the closing stages when Annemiek van Vleuten hit a roadside barrier and brought down all of her three remaining team-mates.

Luckily for Marianne Vos, the London 2012 Olympic gold medallist and 10-time world champion, she escaped the collision, having been surprisingly dropped earlier in the race by her team-mates. 

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]


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