Isaac del Toro won the Giro dell'Emilia on Saturday, beating Tom Pidcock in an exciting end to the one-day cycling race, from which the Israel-Premier Tech team were excluded for safety reasons.
Mexican Del Toro come out on top after the fifth and final climb up the tricky Madonna di San Luca hill in Bologna, which served as the Italian race's finale after 199 kilometres of hard racing.
Lenny Martinez from Bahrain Victorious completed the podium after pipping Egan Bernal to third.
UAE ridern Del Toro has been a revelation this year, winning eight one-day races and a stage at the Giro d'Italia, where he was only beaten to the overall title in dramatic fashion by Simon Yates.
The 21-year-old held the pink jersey at the grand tour from stage nine until the penultimate stage when Briton Yates dropped him and Ecuador's Richard Carapaz, who seemed to be marking each other, to snatch the overall lead in a daring attack in the Italian Alps.
Saturday's race served as one of a series of warm-ups for next weekend's Il Lombardia, the final Monument of the season which this year runs from Como to Bergamo.
Del Toro's star teammate Tadej Pogacar -- the Tour de France and world champion -- will bid to join Italian great Fausto Coppi on five wins at the "Race of the Falling Leaves", and could also become the first man ever to win it five years in a row.
But Israel-Premier Tech may not take part in that race after being forced out of Saturday's event by organisers, who feared protests against the participation of the team, which is owned by Israeli-Canadian billionaire Sylvan Adams.
Four stages of this year's Vuelta a Espana grand tour, including the finale in Madrid, had to be cut short due to mass demonstrations against Israel's continued offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Italian media have reported that the team will not take part in any of the coming week's races in Italy, although organisers RCS have not yet responded to AFP for confirmation that Israel-PT will not compete in Il Lombardia.
The war in Gaza broke out after Palestinian militants led by Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023.
That attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Israel's retaliatory military offensive has since killed at least 65,900 people, also mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, figures the United Nations deems reliable.