First comes the "race of the falling leaves", the Lombardy Tour, and then the final curtain of a long cycling season will soon fall.

These are practiced, even lawful processes in cycling.

Now there are indications that Tadej Pogacar likes to take an important trophy with him on vacation as standard.

The Slovenian superstar won the difficult Tour of Lombardy in northern Italy, one of cycling's monuments, last year as a debutant and this year in his second participation.

No one has ever done that before and the competition seems to be struggling to ensure that Pogacar doesn't build in a win guarantee at the final highlight of the year.

"It's great to repeat this victory," said the 24-year-old after he had sprinted 253 kilometers into the home straight and shaken off his last remaining opponent Enrico Mas (Team Movistar).

"The race went exactly as we had hoped."

Vingegaard powerless

First Pogacar let his team UAE drive at such a tremendous pace that the group of candidates for victory had become small, then he launched the decisive attack on the Civiglio climb, which even Jonas Vingegaard was unable to counter.

The Dane had prevented Pogacar's third consecutive triumph at the Tour de France in the summer.

If the Slovenian now leafs through his 2022 successes on vacation, memories of some big victories from spring to autumn will still come up: Among other things, he won the classic Strade Bianche, the one-week tours UAE Tour and Tirreno-Adriatico, and won in the Tour, in addition to second place overall, three stage wins.

The careers of Vincenzo Nibali (53 successes) and Alejandro Valverde (133) were also rich in victories.

The 37-year-old Italian and the 42-year-old Spaniard rode arm in arm to the last start of their careers in Bergamo on Saturday.

While Nibali, after being left behind by Pogacar, "enjoyed the racing and the roadside atmosphere" at home, as he put it, Valverde finished sixth after a strong performance.

The two old masters and Grand Tour winners helped shape an era in cycling.

“I am happy with my 21-year career.

Now is the time for young people," said Valverde.

A young Berliner, 20-year-old Marco Brenner, was the best German in 38th place at the last monument of the year.

The top German team Bora-hansgrohe also had a solid end to the season in Como.

The Colombian Sergio Higuita, who was in Raubling's service, finished fourth after a grueling ride with around 4500 meters of altitude to overcome.

Meanwhile, Filippo Ganna has set a new hour record.

The Italian from the British team Ineos covered 56.792 kilometers on the track in Grenchen, Switzerland, and significantly improved the record set by his teammate Daniel Bigham (55.548 kilometers) just a few weeks ago.

The two-time time trial world champion Ganna completed his record run on a car, some of the parts of which come from a 3D printer.