Jungels wins Tour of Oman opener

Image 1 of 106

Bob Jungels secured his first victory in Etixx-QuickStep colours as a late solo attack saw him win the opening stage of the 2016 Tour of Oman.

The 23-year-old, who joined the Belgian squad from Trek Factory Racing this winter, attacked with just over 2 kilometres remaining from a select group that had formed after two crucial late climbs. The four-time Luxembourg time trial champion had a 55-tooth chainring on his bike and so managed to open a slim lead on the fast downhill section and managed to stay clear as the road flattened out and then pitched up again in the final 500 metres.

Serge Pauwels (Dimension Data) came home for second six seconds later, followed two seconds later by Romain Bardet (AG2R-La Mondiale) and the rest of the group. With bonus seconds of 10, 6, and 4, on offer for the top three finishers, Jungels now leads the race overall by 10 seconds from Pauwels with Bardet third at 14 seconds.

"We did the recon yesterday and I told the mechanics to put a 55-tooth on the front for the descent. I planned this attack for two days, even longer, so I'm happy with it," Jungels said after pulling on the leader's red jersey.

"My objective was to win a stage and I've done that now. Tomorrow it might be hard to defend my lead but we have Dan Martin who could be really good on Green Mountain. We'll keep taking it day by day."

Richie Porte, a pre-race favourite, saw his general classification ambitions dealt an almost fatal blow as he lost 3:24, having found himself in difficulty on the on the Al Jissah climb – the second and more severe of the two.

The 145.5km opening stage, which started out at the Oman Exhibition Centre, shared its closing kilometres with last year’s second stage, and the two late climbs were once again launchpads for attacks. Things were shaken up on the first climb of Al Hamriyah with 20km to go and though the peloton regrouped on the descent, the legs had been stung and a true selection was made on the steeper slopes of Al Jissah with a little over 5km to go.

A large group of 18 riders went clear in a group that contained most of the big names, such as Vincenzo Nibali and Jakob Fuglsang (Astana), Dan Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), Greg Van Avermaet (BMC), Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin), and others. Eduardo Sepulveda (Fortuneo-Vital Concept) made the selection but crashed on the descent and ended up losing 40 seconds.

Not content to let things come down to a sprint on the uphill drag to the line, Jungels rolled the dice and used his time trialling abilities to earn Etixx-QuickStep their ninth win of the season. He will hope to defend his lead on Wednesday’s stage 2, which features a punchy uphill finish at Quriyat.

How it happened

After just a couple of kilometres Christoph Pfingsten (Bora-Argon 18) and Kenny Dehaes (Wanty Groupe Gobert) sparked the first move of the day and went clear. They were soon joined by Berden De Vries (Roompot Oranje Peloton), Pieter Vanspeybrouck (Topsport-Vlaanderen Baloise), Peter Koning (Drapac) and the quintet rapidly opened up a sizeable advantage over the peloton, carving out six minutes after 15km.

As the riders neared the 50km mark, the gap began to drop steadily thanks to the efforts of Astana and BMC on the front of the peloton. The gap was down to three minutes by the first intermediate sprint at 76km, whereupon De Vries took maximum points, followed by Dehaes and Vanspeybrouck

The breakaway’s cause was not aided by the right-hand change of direction that saw them battle into a headwind on their way through the city of Muscat. That, and the fact that the peloton were ramping things up on the approach to Al Hamriyah - the first climb of the day. Koning and Dehaes dropped off as the gap dipped below a minute with just under 30km to go and the game was up for the other three when the road ramped up on the lower slopes of Al Hamriyah.

The attacks were inevitable at that point, and Pavel Kochetkov (Katusha) duly obliged and was the first rider to go clear, followed by Sébastien Turgot (AG2R-La Mondiale). Turgot was caught on the gentle downhill section in the run-up to the Al Jissah climb, and Amaury Capiot (Topsport Vlaanderen-Baloise) took the points for the second intermediate sprint of the day, though the priority at that stage was getting in position for the finale.

The climb ramped up to double-digit gradients with just over five kilometres to go and the bunch started to break up considerably, with Richie Porte (BMC), a pre-race favourite, among those to be dropped, along with Alexander Kristoff (Katusha)

By the top of the climb a group of 18 riders was in the lead with a small advantage, with Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) in a prominent position. With him and Jungels, Pauwels, and Bardet were: Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data), Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin), Greg Van Avermaet (BMC), Eduardo Sepulveda( Fortuneo Vital Concept), Rui Costa (Lampre-Merida), Davide Rebellin (CCC Sprandi Polkowice), Floris de Tier (Topsport), Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), Dan Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), Domenico Pozzovivo (AG2R-La Mondiale), Patrick Konrad (Bora-Argon 18), Jacques Janse Van Resnburg (Dimension Data), and Jurgen van den Broeck (Katusha).

That group, with the exception of Sepulveda who suffered a crash on the final climb, stayed together, with riders coming home in fragmented groups as Jungels basked in his first win of the season.

Full Results