Tour of Oman Stage 2: Peter Sagan wins for Liquigas-Cannondale, moves into race lead

Peter Sagan of Liquigas-Cannondale, who lay seventh overall after yesterday’s opening stage, has won Stage 2 of the Tour of Oman and takes over the race lead from Lotto-Belisol's André Greipel. GreenEdge's Baden Cooke was second today, with Rabobank's Tom Slagter third.

The late arrival of a ferry caused an hour’s delay to the start of the 140.5km stage mainly along the coast from Sur to the Wadi Dayqah Dam. Once the riders did start racing, however, it didn’t take long for a four-man breakaway to form.

Three of those riders – Martin Kohler and Klaas Lodewijk of BMC Racing and Farnese Vini’s Diego Caccia – still had two and a half minutes on the chasing peloton with 20km to go, and with the route heading inland on rolling roads, it wasn’t guaranteed they would be caught.

The gap was halved over the next 10 kilometres, however, and the catch finally made 5km out as the race headed towards its finale, with Liquigas-Cannondale among those working hard at the front, on what would prove to be a successful afternoon for them.

Tour of Oman Stage 2 result   
   
1  SAGAN Peter          LIQUIGAS-CANNONDALE       3h 10' 44"
2  COOKE Baden          GREENEDGE CYCLING TEAM    Same time
3  SLAGTER Tom          RABOBANK CYCLING TEAM         "
4  GALLOPIN Tony        RADIOSHACK-NISSAN             "
5  NAVARDAUSKAS Ramunas GARMIN - BARRACUDA            "
6  BOUHANNI Nacer       FDJ-BIGMAT                    "
7  SUTTON Christopher   SKY PROCYCLING                "
8  FUGLSANG Jakob       RADIOSHACK-NISSAN             "
9  CANCELLARA Fabian    RADIOSHACK-NISSAN         + 00' 04"
10 GREIPEL André        LOTTO-BELISOL TEAM            "
11 LEBAS Thomas         BRIDGESTONE ANCHOR        + 00' 06"
12 RODRIGUEZ Joaquin    KATUSHA TEAM                  "
13 NIBALI Vincenzo      LIQUIGAS-CANNONDALE       + 00' 09"
14 VELITS Peter         OMEGA PHARMA-QUICK STEP       "
15 CASAR Sandy          FDJ-BIGMAT                + 00' 13"
16 KUCHYNSKI Aliaksandr KATUSHA TEAM                  "
17 VAN WINDEN Dennis    RABOBANK CYCLING TEAM         "
18 JEANNESSON Arnold    FDJ-BIGMAT                    "
19 GUSEV Vladimir       KATUSHA TEAM                  "
20 SCHÄR Michael        BMC RACING TEAM               "

Tour of Oman Overall Standings after Stage 2   
   
1  SAGAN Peter          LIQUIGAS-CANNONDALE      6h 36' 43"
2  GREIPEL André        LOTTO-BELISOL TEAM        + 00' 04"
3  COOKE Baden          GREENEDGE CYCLING TEAM    + 00' 07"
4  SLAGTER Tom          RABOBANK CYCLING TEAM     + 00' 09"
5  BOUHANNI Nacer       FDJ-BIGMAT                + 00' 10"
6  GALLOPIN Tony        RADIOSHACK-NISSAN         + 00' 10"
7  SUTTON Christopher   SKY PROCYCLING            + 00' 10"
8  FUGLSANG Jakob       RADIOSHACK-NISSAN         + 00' 13"
9  NAVARDAUSKAS Ramunas GARMIN - BARRACUDA        + 00' 13"
10 CANCELLARA Fabian    RADIOSHACK-NISSAN         + 00' 17"