Davide Ballerini has won Omloop Het Nieuwsblad after a great team performance by Deceuninck-QuickStep.
However, while Ballerini was winning a one-day race of this calibre for the first time in his career, the performance of the rider who placed 2nd, Jake Stewart, was also very impressive.
Stewart is a 21-year-old British neo pro with Groupama-FDJ and overcame being slightly boxed in during the sprint today to take the runner-up slot, just ahead of Sep Vanmarcke (Israel Start-Up Nation) in 3rd.
Heinrich Haussler, the 37-year-old Australian with Bahrain-Victorious was 4th and Philippe Gilbert (39) of Lotto Soudal was 5th.
The only Irish rider in the race, Ryan Mullen of Trek-Segafredo, was 91st and finished in a group 4:26 down on the 50-strong front group.
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What a sprint!@ballero_94 wins #OHN21 for @deceuninck_qst ! pic.twitter.com/xEnI7gcD1x
— Cycling on TNT Sports (@cyclingontnt) February 27, 2021
The race came down to a mass bunch sprint from what was left of the peloton, with Ballerini (26) getting a brilliant lead-out from his team, after Julian Alaphilippe had gone solo earlier in the race but was reeled in.
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Ballerini, who had already taken two stage wins at Tour de la Provence this month, made no mistake in the final dash to line, taking a clear win.
Jake Stewart had already shown very good form before today by taking three top 10 stage placings in Etoile de Bessèges including in the final TT, and placing 4th overall.
Tom Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers) also rode well today and got clear in the breakaway group that Alaphilippe attacked from. The young British rider tried to attack a number of times after the world champion in the finale but was reeled in.
However, the remains of the peloton mopped up all of those ahead and despite an attack by Gianni Moscon (Ineos Grenadiers) a large group arrived at the finish in Ninove to sprint it out for victory after 200km of racing.
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