Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) tried to add Lombardia to his long list of victories, but came up just short, beating Tour de France winner Egan Bernal (Team Ineos) in the sprint in Como, but giving up the escape to Bauke Morema ( Trek-Segafredo), who ceded victory to him. [Meanwhile, Valverde managed to drop all but Bernal and Jacob Fuglsang (Astana) to second place.

"I'm happy with this second place, but it's bittersweet considering I had the legs to win," said the 2018 world champion.

"There are a lot of situations near the end where everyone is looking at each other, making it easier for the less cautious solo riders to go away and stay at the front until the end. Bauke took advantage of that and attacked, moving big and using his energy well to succeed. He deserved to be the winner."

Primoz Roglic chased Morema alone, but Valverde and the other riders chased him down on the final climb to San Fermo, where Valverde tried to shake off the others.

"I tried to attack again on San Fermo. I jumped in front at Civiglio, but once I got caught I didn't want to hold the pace because there was still a tough climb left.

Unfortunately, the chasers were unable to pull the Dutchman back and Bauquet crossed the finish line with a 16-second advantage. Valverder reduced the first chase group to three riders and kicked off Bernal and Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) to take second place behind Michael Woods in Wednesday's Milan Torino.

"Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, that's cycling. Next year I will be 40 years old and it will be hard to try to win here again. But you know you've been here a long time and you've done better than the season before.