Yates retains Tour of Oman crown
Muscat, Feb 12
British rider Adam Yates of UAE Team Emirates-XRG retained his Tour of Oman overall title with a final push on Jabal Al Akhdar to stay clear of stage winner Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-QuickStep) by six seconds on Wednesday.
Paret-Peintre came on top in 03:13:15 as Yates (+02) took second spot and race leader David Gaudu (+45) ended up third in the decisive stage on the steep slopes of Jabal Al Akhdar Mountain.
Groupama-FDJ's Gaudu was pulled back by Yates and Paret-Peintre in the final two kilometres. The French cyclist made a last-ditch effort to catch up Yates but the Briton pushed the gas again in the final kilometre and Gaudu was unable to stay with the top two.
Yates, nevertheless, sealed his second straight Tour of Oman crown when he finished close on the heels of Frenchman Paret-Peintre. Yates, who did not win any of the stages in Oman, accumulated an overall timing of 21:13:18 in covering the total distance of 881.4 km to take the overall winner's red jersey.
Yates said his team nicely tackled the stage.
''This is a long and very hard climb. I knew that if we set our pace I might have a chance. We had a good stage.''
'In the end, Jay (Vine) helped me set up pace at the climb. I wanted to raise speed and take the lead but it was tough,' Yates said.
Driven by his exploits on the Green Mountain, Paret-Peintre raced up the table to finish second and six seconds adrift of the winner. Gaudu was 39 seconds adrift and finished third overall.
''I thought I could win the GC so I tried to attack Yates but I saw that I was not strong enough to create a big gap. So I waited for the last 100m and I went full gas,'' Paret-Peintre said.
SUMMIT FINISH
The summit finish on the slopes of Al Jabal Al Akhdhar — Green Mountain, was the highlight of the 138.5km final stage that included a valley road loop. It ends with six kilometres of climbing at an average of 9.9%.
Teammate Jay Vine of Australia played a key role for Yates in the final four kilometres by helping to rein in the attackers and affect the GC group. Damien Howson (Q36.5) crashed in one of the steep slopes of Green Mountain, as he had to chase back. He finished seventh on the stage and fourth overall.
In the points classification, Paret-Peintre took top spot with 34 points with double stage winner Olav Kooij of Team Visma-Lease a Bike second on 30 and Yates third on 27. The Frenchman also won the white jersey for the best young rider.
Spaniard Rodrigo Alvarez Rodriguez of Burgos Burpellet — BH was the most aggressive rider of the Tour with 15 points.
Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team (63:46:07) was the best team of the Tour while Tudor (+02:17) claimed second and XDS Astana (+02:55) finished third among the 18 teams.
Competing against the professional teams, Oman National Team cyclists ended up last with an overall timing of 66:23:50.
In the overall individual classification, Said al Rahbi (103rd ) was the best among the local riders as others Abdulrahman al Yaaqoubi, Mazin al Riyami and Mohammed al Wahibi finished as the last three respectively in the 110-strong list.
Tour of Oman Stage 5 Results
Rank, Rider, Country, Team, Time
1. Valentin Paret-Peintre, France, Soudal Quick-Step, 03:13:15
2. Adam Yates, Great Britain, UAE Team Emirates-XRG, + 02
3. David Gaudu, France, Groupama-FDJ, + 45
4. Embret Svestad-Bardseng, Norway, Arkea-B&B Hotels, + 51
5. Cian Uijtdebroeks, Belgium, Team Visma-Lease a Bike, + 51
6. Wout Poels, Netherlands, XDS Astana Team, + 51
7. Damien Howson, Australia, Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team, + 57
8. Chris Harper, Australia, Team Jayco-AlUla, + 57
9. Jay Vine, Australia, UAE Team Emirates-XRG, + 01:15
10. Marco Brenner, Germany, Tudor Pro Cycling Team, + 01:15
General Classification after Stage 5
Rank, Rider, Country, Team, Time
1. Adam Yates, Great Britain, UAE Team Emirates-XRG, 21:13:18
2. Valentin Paret-Peintre, France, Soudal Quick-Step, + 06
3. David Gaudu, France, Groupama-FDJ, + 39
4. Damien Howson, Australia, Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team, + 01:07
5. Cian Uijtdebroeks, Belgium, Team Visma-Lease a Bike, + 01:16
6. Chris Harper, Australia, Team Jayco-AlUla, + 01:22
7. Wout Poels, Netherlands, XDS Astana Team, + 01:23
8. Embret Svestad-Bardseng, Norway, Arkea-B&B Hotels, + 01:27
9. Marco Brenner, Germany, Tudor Pro Cycling Team, + 01:37
10. Simon Dalby, Denmark, Uno-X Mobility, + 02:05
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