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Tour of Oman 2014: stage one – five observations

Andre Greipel moves into an early lead as Omega Pharma-Quickstep miss out

Omega Pharma-Quickstep’s lead-out train certainly earned its fair share of dressing downs from Mark Cavendish last season, with a few costly errors denying their lead sprinter more victories to add to his bulging palmares. The Manx Missile, who has endured a frustrating start to the year despite the signing of former HTC-Highroad lead-out man Mark Renshaw, will attempt to kickstart his season at the Volta ao Algarve this week but for his team-mates in Oman there were more important lessons to learn.

Tom Boonen (third left) gives a wry look as the Omega Pharma-Quickstep sprint train failed to drive home their advantage (pic: Bruno Bade/ASO)

Bidding to set up Tom Boonen for the sprint, Omega Pharma-Quickstep seized the initiative after Belkin led the sprint out, and appeared to have perfect road position. With Lotto-Belisol boxed in, and FDJ.fr also struggling to come to the front, they only had to maintain their advantage to see Boonen home. But their hard work was to count for nothing when a slight drifting into the middle opened up a huge gap, protected from the crosswinds, for Lotto-Belisol to come to the front. And as they have proved already this season, they are not going to pass up a chance like that.

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