October 1, 2010 (Geelong, Australia) – Guillaume Boivin won bronze for Canada in a thrilling and unique finish to the U23 Men’s competition that saw Australia’s Michael Matthews win the first road race at the 2010 UCI Road Worlds, besting 46 riders in a bunch sprint finish. Germany’s Michael John Degenkolb was second while Boivin of Longueuil, Quebec, tied with American Taylor Phinney for the bronze – the first documented tie at the road world championships.

The all-Quebecios Canadian team rode a very strong race. David Boiley finished 16th and helped Boivin in the final stretch for his historic bronze. Arnaud Papillon finished in the middle the group in 21st while Hugo Houle, who was the victim of a poorly timed puncture, finishing 93rd.

The race unfolded differently than most expected with a sole rider going off on his own as American Ben King escaped on the first lap of the 10×15.9km lap road race while the peloton was happy to sit up. A few riders tried to bridge up to King who was running consistently quick lap times on his own. Eventually a chase led by the French, Italians, and Australians reeled him in with 3.5 laps to go. Once King was in sight of the peloton a series of counterattacks went but a strong Squadra Azzura presence at the front did not allow anyone to get a decent gap.

On the last lap the Australian Cyclones did a great job of policing the front of the pack to ensure a bunch sprint for Matthews. At 150 meters to go the Aussie pulled off Phinney’s wheel to win the race by seven bike lengths. Degenkolb was able to sprint to second after going on the attack several times in the last two laps. Boivin went hard up the left side and looked like he had the bronze medal but a late lunge to the line by Phinney caught him for the tie.

The UCI employed its photo finishing equipment to try to assign a medal, but the riders finished identically down to the pixel resulting in the historic tie.

Matthews, who will race for the Dutch Rabobank team next year and is nicknamed “bling” for his love of jewelry was on cloud nine amidst the home town fans. “I’m speechless, I don’t know what to say,” said Matthews. “I don’t know if it ever will (sink in) really, it’s just a dream come true and dreams don’t usually come true, it’s unbelievable.”

Degenkolb of Germany commented, “I start every race wanting to win, but silver is not bad.” Phinney who will race for the American BMC team next year was initially worried about the climbs but the slow early pace played to his favour. “To share this with Guillaume is kind of cool,” said Phinney. “We’ve raced for years together. We battled it out in the sprints at the Tour of Abitibi when we were juniors.”

Boivin talked about his form entering the race. “We went to Europe and I won a couple of races there in the month of August. I knew I was in good form coming here even though people didn’t see me as a contender because I wasn’t at l’Avenir, but I did a couple of ProTour races we had in Canada two or three weeks ago.”

Boivin who has signed a two-year contract to ride for Steve Bauer’s SpiderTech p/b Planet Energy team said he is excited to do more racing in Europe next year. We caught up with the legendary Bauer for his reaction on Boivin’s performance. “We knew Guillaume had a good chance to win. I think he will be reviewing that final kilometer in his mind until the Worlds in Denmark next year,” said Bauer.

Boiley racing at his second U23 world championships was very happy with his result saying, “I am very happy, from getting dropped last year to 16th, I can’t complain. It was a strange race, worlds is usually a very aggressive, but this was more of a ‘tactical’ race.” Asked if he was a help to Boivin late in the game, he said, “I tried with one and a half km to go to bring him a few positions further up, but we nearly crashed. Guys were going down everywhere.”

Papillon was also satisfied with his performance commenting, “My race was pretty good I think. I was happy that the first half was slow. I think got stronger near the end.”

Houle was having a strong race until a front flat with just over two to go took him out of contention. Mechanic Sean Kelly added, “I think he flatted at the fastest part of the whole race.” After hitting a pothole the Shimano neutral vehicle was able to get him a front wheel quickly but the race was already gone.

Houle had advice for those riding the road race on Sunday saying, “The best way to ride the first climb is to start with good position, then pull back a bit and have strength for the next climb.”

Full results and more photos here.