Sir Bradley Wiggins is the new UCI Road World Championships Elite Men's Individual Time Trial Champion.
The riders started on a 47.1km course in Ponferrada, some 250km out of Madrid, with Macedonia's Georgi Popstefanov the first man down the ramp on a sunny afternoon but it was Sweden's Tobias Lidvigsson, who was the first man home in 59.58.
Moldovan Alexandr Pluischin took over as the leader in a time of 59.13.42 before Ireland's Nicholas Roche went down the ramp.
Estonia's Tamel Kangert then finished in 58.58.14, Russian Artem Ovechkin came home in 58.43 and then Portugal's Nelson Olivera finished in 57.47.
There were two representatives for Great Britain with Alex Dowsett going down the ramp at 3.18pm local time and Sir Bradley Wiggins, the current British Time Trial champion who took the title off Dowsett, the penultimate rider before Tony Martin, who has won this competition for the last three years went off.
Nicholas Roche finished in 1.00.15, whilst at the first time check, Wiggins, who will attempt Jens Voigt's hour record next year, was fastest, beating the time set by Sylvain Chavanel before Tony Martin sailed through four seconds quicker.
BMC's Rohan Dennis of Australia, Bradley Wiggins and Tony Martin were neck and neck on the road with Wiggins going through the second time check with 23kms gone, 2,64 seconds ahead of Martin and seven seconds ahead of Dennis.
At the finish line in Ponferrada, riders were continuing to finish with no-one affecting the time of current lead Nelson Olivera.
Wiggins was through the third time check in 41.50 as Dowsett, who admitted to not feeling at his best, finished in 59.00. Martin was 9.64 seconds slower than Wiggins at the third time check and now it was advantage Wiggins going into the closing kilometres.
Wiggins continued to look good with the GPS showing the Team Sky rider to be twenty seconds ahead of Martin.
His Team Sky Team mate Vasil Kiriyanka of Belarus came home in 57.13 to take a provisional lead.
Rohan Dennis finished in 57.22, leaving four riders to finish. Adrian Malori finished in 57.37 as Wiggins was hitting speeds of 40mph.
Dutchman Tom Dumoulin went quickest in 57.05, leaving the question as to what medal the Giant Shimano rider would get.
This was now an England versus Germany battle of epic proportions and Wiggins flew home in 56.25.52 after a superb ride.
Martin came onto the finishing straight but his rein was over as he finished in 56.51 and Wiggins was the gold medal winner and the new World Time Trial champion.
"I dont know what to say really," said Wiggins after his victory. "I knew I had the legs. If I was to beat Tony it was on a course like this. I want to dedicate this to my family.
"My last World Time Trial Championship and I finish up with a gold medal. I was quite relaxed and knew I was strong so job done. I paced it perfectly. I heard I was ten seconds up and I pushed it all the way. Add this to the British and Olympic titles and I have the set which is fantastic."
Result
1 Wiggins 56.25
2 T Martin +26/23
3 T Dumoulin +40.64
4 Kiryienka +47.92
5 Dennis +57.74
6 Malori +1.11.62