One week ago, Tom Dumoulin lost the Tour of Alberta by the tiniest of margin to continue a frustrating series of second places. Yesterday the Dutchman was again agonizingly close to a win when he was passed by Simon Gerrans just metres from the line in the GP Quebec.

Tom Dumoulin was just metres short of a huge victory at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec after a powerful final attack in the last 200m uphill finish.

Dumoulin initially pulled clear and looked swt to take the victory but a big effort to overhaul him by Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEDGE) was enough to deny him victory. Dumoulin finished alongside Gerrans in second, continuing his strong performance at the Tour of Alberta last week.

The race was animated by a breakaway of four riders, moving clear in the early stages of the 199km race to push on for an advantage of over eight minutes.

These four ploughed on ahead but never really looked like they stood a chance of staying away, while behind the peloton was patrolled by Orica GreenEDGE and others, with Team Giant-Shimano waiting in the wings so to speak.

The front of the race was all back together with just over 50km to go, but with still quite a distance to race the attacks started to come once again.

Nothing managed to stick however, with an eleven man move looking the most dangerous but the gaps were always seconds rather than minutes and with around seven kilometres to go the race was gruppo compacto – set up for a nail biting finish.

As the sprint lead-out was opened up Dumoulin launched a long sprint on the uphill drag to the line and initially pulled out a gap over those behind him, but Gerrans dug in and chased down Dumoulin's wheel before just managing to come past him on the line to take the victory, denying the 23-year-old Dutch-man.

Coach Aike Visbeek said after the race: “We came here to win but we were outsiders for the victory. The plan was to go for Tom and Simon, and the guys worked hard for this. We made a plan for this scenario and it worked well as both were present at the end.

“Tom went early as he had Reinardt on his wheel and it was a good move. Racing in Alberta benefitted us today and I am happy we showed that we can win races like this, but also disappointed to miss out by so little.”

Dumoulin said after the finish: “It was a really good race today. I had Daan with me the whole day and we managed to stay invisible and in the right places.

“At the end I had to go early, I had Reinardt in my wheel and I thought that I would either lead him out of he would leave a gap giving me a good chance of victory. It turned out to be the last one but in the end it was second and it’s disappointing to miss out here.

"I had a lot of second places this year and last. Alberta was more disappointing than today. I still lost in the last five meters, so I am disappointed a bit. but it's my first time to be up there in a classic with the best riders, so I'm happy for that. But when you get passed in the last five meters the first reaction is to be pissed. I think tomorrow I will look back on it with a positive feeling.

"I've never done Montreal before. Normally this kind of finish suits me very well. I'm looking forward to it and hope to do a good result again."

Geschke added: “Personally I am not happy with my finish today. I had the legs for better than 18th but when the sprint started I was too far back.

“I am happy that Tom could achieve the result he did. It shows that we can challenge for the win here in these sorts of races.”