It was the first finish of its kind in the seven-year history of the event, with every edition until yesterday’s being taken out by a clear margin. It was a fitting conclusion to an attritional race which was contested in atrocious conditions.

Grenfell, who rides with the Bike Bug team, was part of a group of around 20 riders who reeled in breakaway leader Adam Phelan with five kilometres to go before his team-mate Andrew Crawley led him out perfectly in the run to the line.

Grenfell was good enough to get the best of a fierce sprint up Pit Lane at Mount Panorama and edged out a big chasing pack in a time of two hours, 43 minutes, 12.23 seconds.

“The boys in my team put me in a good position in the end, there were a few attacks here and there in that last five kilometres but every time we managed to pull them in and then Andrew led me out perfectly,” Grenfell said before adding a wry smile with his appraisal of the weather.

“They were great conditions to ride in, wet and windy – that’s how I like it.”

Early in the race, the main group set a cracking pace and averaged around 50km per hour over the opening 30km, with a handful of escape attempts ensuring that the peloton was on its toes.

A two-man group escaped soon after and were joined by a further seven riders. This bunch gradually pushed their advantage out to 50 seconds over the peloton.

Both Phelan and Grenfell were part of that group, and by his own admission Grenfell and his team-mate Crawley, who was also in the break, only did what they had to during their time off the front.

“We worked a little bit but then we hit the climb at Rockley Mountain and at that stage I just tapped along with the break and we got caught at the top by the main field,” he explained.

That peloton had been effectively halved in number thanks to a nasty crash not far from the Rockley climb that involved around 40 riders and saw 20 retire from the race.