Philipsen outsprints Kooij to win Elfstedenrace after echelon battle

Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) outsprinted Olav Kooij (Jumbo-Visma) to victory out of a small group at the 2023 Elfstedenrace after 204.8km of hard racing in the windy Dutch province of Friesland. 

Kooij hit the front first, sprinting alongside the right-hand barrier which forced Philipsen to launch into the wind. But the Belgian once again showed that he is the best sprinter in the world, overpowering Kooij in the final 50 metres. 

TDT-Unibet’s Davide Bomboi finished third after great race tactics throughout the day from the Dutch team, which will move to a ProTeam in 2023. Luka Mezgec (Jayco-AlUla) was fourth. 

This was Philipsen’s 15th win of the season, kicking out of the Dutchman’s wheel in the final run to the line. He moved to within one win behind former teammate and friend Tadej Pogačar’s tally of 16 wins in 2023.

The tough racing right from the flag split the groups throughout the day with the big favourites getting involved behind the seven-man breakaway of Tim Marsman (Metec-SOLARWATT p/b Mantel), Max Kroonen (VolkerWessels), Wessel Mouris (Scorpions), Martijn Rasenberg (ABLOC), Rick Ottema (Allinq), Joren Bloem (TDT-Unibet) and Joshua Huppertz (Lotto-Kern Haus).

With the echelons starting to form, Kooij and Philipsen found themselves towards the front with teammates in a very strong group, Edoardo Affini And Lars Boven for Jumbo-Visma and Edward Planckaert, Fabio Van den Bossche and Lionel Taminiaux for Alpecin-Deceuninck. 

Dylan Groenewegen (Jayco-AlUla), Sam Welsford (Team dsm-firmenich) and Gerben Thijssen (Intermarché-Circus-Wanty) were the main fast men to miss out on the move, with Kooij and Philipsen again highlighting how they are much more racers than purely bunch sprinters. 

The gap to the leading group did stabilise around the one-minute mark for a while until the final 25km of racing where it quickly halved under Jayco-AlUla’s drive behind, with those up front starting to feel the pain, but the chase quickly ran out of firepower. 

Results

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