The 26-year-old Olympic silver medallist from Norwich rode practically the entire 11-lap, 110.66-kilometre race with no help from her Cervelo Test Team after opening up a 28-second lead on the first lap and growing it to more than three minutes by the sixth lap.

Pooley, who finished second in the women's time trial at the Olympics in Beijing last year, began to dwindle over the final five laps of the race, but it was too great by that point to be made up by the chase peloton.

 

She said: "The last three laps I was really tired, but I had a three minute lead and they would have to ride a lot faster than me to catch me.

 

"I knew my teammates were waiting behind me and that if I got caught then someone else from my team would go.

 

"It's only a strong team that does it."
 

Second-place finisher Emma Johansson of Sweden earned enough points to take over the overall lead on the Women's World Cup circuit.

 

Johansson passed Marianne Vos of the Netherlands, who was not competing in Montreal.
 

She said: "The next World Cup race will be in Sweden, so it's really nice for me and the sport of cycling in Sweden for me to be able to take the jersey back.

 

Johansson beat out Germany's Trixi Worrack of Germany in a final sprint for second place, 74 seconds after Pooley crossed the line.