Belgium's Phillippe Gilbert, made it a hat-trick of classics when he won the Liège-Bastogne-Liège Classic this afternoon.
One hundred and ninety nine riders left the Belgian city which will host Le Grand Depart of the Tour De France in 2012 in eighteen degrees and eight riders initially got clear.
Sébastien Delfosse (Landbouwkrediet), Jesus Herrada Lopez (Movistar), David Le Lay (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Fredrik Kessiakoff (Astana), Eduard Vorganov (Katusha), Thomas De Gendt (Vacansoleil-DCM), Tony Gallopin (Cofidis), Mickael Delage (FDJ) and Yannick Talabardon (Saur-Sojasun) as attention turned to whether Phillippe Gilbert could complete a hat-trick of the Amstel Gold, Fleche Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège for the first time in 2004 when Davide Rebellin did it.
When the race reached Bastogne with still 154km of 257.5km remaining, the escapees had grown in number to ten and were 3 mins forty seconds clear of a peleton lead by Omega Pharma Lotto.
Ireland's Nicholas Roche (pictured below) who had crashed on Wednesday and ended up in hospital was safely in the peleton.
Thomas De Gendt took the riders over the Côte de Wanne and also over the Cote de Stockeu as his leading group of ten riders was persued by Enrico Gasparotto (Astana), Juan Manuel Garate (Rabobank), Greg Van Avermaet (BMC), Jerome Pineau (Quick Step), Blel Kadri (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Dario Cataldo (Quick Step), Damiano Caruso (Liquigas-Cannondale), Laurens Ten Dam (Rabobank), Yannick Talabardon (Saur-Sojasun) and Mickael Delage (FDJ).
On the slopes of the Masquisard, with 60kms to, the break was over. Frank and Andy Schleck of Leopard Trek started to make their move followed by Gilbert's Omega Pharma Lotto's team.
Greg Van Avermaet went with the Schlecks and Gilbert but was dropped with 6kms to go. No-one could get near this trio.
Andy Schleck led them into the finishing straight but Phillippe Gilbert shot past to win in a time of 6hr 13 mins with Frank Schleck second and Andy Schleck third.
1 Philippe Gilbert (Bel) Omega Pharma-Lotto
2 Fränk Schleck (Lux) Leopard Trek
3 Andy Schleck (Lux) Leopard Trek
4 Roman Kreuziger (Cze) Pro Team Astana
5 Rigoberto Uran Uran (Col) Sky Procycling
6 Chris Anker Sörensen (Den) Saxo Bank Sungard
7 Greg Van Avermaet (Bel) BMC Racing Team
8 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale
9 Björn Leukemans (Bel) Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team
10 Samuel Sanchez Gonzalez (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi