Visma | Lease a Bike youngster shines again in Oman as Uno-X’s Blikra takes stage 4 sprint win

On Monday, Mauro Schmid had taken over the overall lead in Oman. The Swiss champion caught Nairo Quintana (Movistar) in the final few hundred metres on the Eastern Mountain finish and then proved too fast in the sprint for Christian Scaroni (Astana).

Stage 4 looked, on paper, like another pure sprint day — much like stage 1. With a fully flat route to Sohar, it was hard to imagine anything other than a bunch finish, meaning the sprint trains of riders like Molano, Fernando Gaviria (Caja Rural–Seguros RGA) and Brian Coquard (Cofidis) had the job of controlling the day.

From the gun, two riders jumped clear. Once again it was Goszczurny representing Visma | Lease a Bike in the break, joined by Warre Vangheluwe (Soudal Quick-Step). Baptiste Veistroffer — leader of the points classification — briefly tried to bridge across, but his move came to nothing.

On Oman’s wide-open roads there were two intermediate sprints on the route, and the Visma youngster had his eye on them. Goszczurny led the intermediate sprint classification and, by winning both sprints, he secured the gold leader’s jersey.

“I enjoyed another day in the break,” he said afterwards. “It wasn’t easy, but we gave everything to go for the stage win. I’ll definitely take this experience with me into the future. It was a goal to go all-in for the gold jersey, so I’m happy I was able to secure it today. I can look back on four good stages.”

With 30 kilometres to go, the pace lifted in the bunch. The wind made things nervous and Jayco AlUla moved to the front in support of race leader Schmid, but true echelons never formed and the sprint scenario stayed intact.

The duo out front still held on with four kilometres remaining, forcing the sprint teams to accelerate the chase. The break was finally caught at around three kilometres to go. Into the final kilometre, Alpecin-Deceuninck took control for Gerben Thijssen, but the Belgian couldn’t come through. Instead, Blikra timed it perfectly for Uno-X Mobility and took the win in Sohar. Houcou and Molano finished second and third, while Rick Pluimers sprinted to sixth.