Olav Kooij delivered Visma-Lease a Bike their first victory of 2025 as the Dutch sprinter strode to a fast opening sprint win in Bimmah Sink Hole on the opening stage of the 2025 Tour of Oman.
Fernando Gaviria (Movistar) opened up the sprint following a fight between the Movistar, Picnic PostNL and Visma-Lease a Bike sprint trains, but Kooij found himself on the Colombian's wheel in the final 300m. He took advantage of his early move to sprint to victory ahead of Pavel Bittner (Picnic PostNL) with Erlend Blikra (Uno-X Mobility) taking third.
"We really wanted to go for the stage, and we took control," Kooij said immediately after the race finish. "So yeah, thanks to the boys for making it in the sprint in the first place.
"They gave me a really good run into the last 500 meters. And then yeah, I found a good wheel and could launch my sprint," he said.
The Muscat Classic on Friday gave Visma-Lease a Bike a strong indication of the sprint setup in today's stage race opener. "After yesterday, we knew a little bit what to expect," Kooij said. "And yeah, we executed a good plan today."
Gaviria arguably opened his sprint too early, leaving Kooij open to following his wheel into the final sprint. "I mean, he's very fast, but yeah, he went quite early," Kooik said. "I could follow the wheel and use it to my advantage.
"We're in the lead jersey," he added, "We will enjoy this one."
The flat sprint stage unfolded in a predictable manner on the wider windy plains from Bushar to Bimmah Sink Hole.
A breakaway formed early in the stage, which contained teammates Said Alrahbi and Mohammed Al-Wahibi (Oman National Team), Rodrigo Álvarez (Burgos Burpellet), Kane Richards (Roojai Insurance).
The break stretched to a comfortable lead of over 3 minutes at 100km remaining, which spread out further to 3:15 with 85km to go.
However, as the race approached the final 50km, the pressure from the sprint teams began to mount with the four escapees holding barely 1:30 with 50m remaining.
Visma-Lease a BIke were conspicuous on the front of the peloton, pushing in support of sprinter and likely stage favourite Olav Kooij.
The breakaway fragmented and was caught with 25km to go as sprint teams began to work into formation as the peloton moved up the coast of the Sea of Oman toward the finish in Bimmah Sink Hole.
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