During the stage, little happened until the final climb. Team Jumbo-Visma controlled the stage the whole day and opened the battle on Jebel Hafeet with Koen Bouwman and an impressive Laurens De Plus. After De Plus had done his job, Roglic attacked. He was joined by David Gaudu, Emanuel Buchmann, Dan Martin and later also Valverde. Roglic continued to pull in the interest of his classification, after which Valverde was faster in the sprint.

Roglic was full of praise for his teammates. “In addition to defending my classification, I also tried to win the stage. The stage win was not successful, but I did a great job GC-wise. I am here for the first time and did not know the climb. So I just climbed it as fast as possible. I have not been able to do all this without the massive work of my teammates. Their work gave me a lot of confidence and extra strength. They were all very strong today and everything went according to plan.”