Phillippe Gilbert followed up his Amstel Gold Classice victory by winning the La Flèche Wallonne Classic race in Belgium this afternoon.
La Flèche Wallonne is a 201km race from Charleroi to Mur De Huy through the Ardennes region and saw Maciej Paterski, Preben Van Hecke, Maxime Vantomme and Matti Helminen break away early.
They got sixteen and a half minutes clear before the peleton which lost Irishman Nicholas Roche who was taken to hospital following a crash, started to pull them back.
Most of the main teams got a rider up into a group which got ahead of the main peleton and reduced the gap between the leaders.
Quick Step's Jerome Pineau and Vacansoleil's Marco Marcato brdiged the gap and took over the running at the front. They went over the last climb of the day and with two kilometres to go were still seventeen seconds clear.
The final kilometre was on the hill and the front two were caught. Belgium's Phillipe Gilbert went with 500 metres to go and won in a time of 4hr 54 mins, 58 seconds.
Joaquin Rodriguez was second, with Samuel Sanchez third and Andy Schleck fourth.
Nicole Cooke, whose father and grandfather hail from Coventry finished fifth in the women's Fleche Wallonne.