Along the way, the Team Visma | Lease a Bike riders were alert to sudden shifts in the wind. After less than a hundred kilometers of racing, from one moment to the next it was chaos in the peloton. The wind broke the large group into pieces, and Valter and Lemmen, among others, proved to be on the mark. However, the resulting damage was quickly undone by the chasing groups, after which calm returned.

In the last kilometer towards the summit of Jebel Jais, Australian winner Ben O'Connor made his decisive attack. In his trail several strong climbers finished, with Valter eventually in sixth place. With that performance, the Hungarian also sneaked into the top ten of the overall ranking.

"We can conclude that the team had a good stage today," sports director Maarten Wynants says. "During the echelons the guys were in the front. Towards the final climb, Attila and Bart were kept well at the front. Bart sensed a slight decrease in his performance today, but nevertheless rode up with the better riders. Attila said he had a very good day. Towards the end he even felt he could have done more. That's a good sign for the uphill finish coming up later this week! But first the focus will be back on sprinting in the coming days."