Olav Kooij dominates sprint on stage 2 at the Tour of Britain
Olav Kooij made it back to back wins in the 2025 Tour of Britain, winning stage 2 in Stowmarket with utter domination. Kooij also moves up to 4th in the all time list of Tour of Britain Men stage wins with 6 in total across the 2023 and current editions.
Stage 2 of the Tour of Britain was a 169.3 kilometre stage from starting and finishing in Stowmarket, in the South East of England, covering just 873 metres of elevation across the stage.
Similar to the opening stage, the breakaway of the day was formed from the get go with Andreas Stockbro (Unibet Tietema Rockets), Baptiste Veistroffer (Lotto), Rafael Reis (Anicolor / Tien 21) and Hartthijs de Vries (Unibet Tietema Rockets) and the group of four obtained a maximum advantage of just under 3 minutes.
The typical British weather had to make its presence known once more, as moderate winds in the high 20's km/h mark and a heavy rain shower soaked the peloton for the majority of the stage in Suffolk.
Taking command of the peloton as the race approached the 25 kilometre to go mark were Uno-X Mobility and Lotto.
They looked set to tee up their riders, Alexander Kristoff and Milan Menten, respectively as the breakaway of the day was trimmed down to three riders who pushed on valiantly with over a minute advantage and contesting the classified climb of the day.
Into the last 15 kilometres, Veistroffer, Stokbro and De Vries continued on their breakaway adventure as the clouds above began to clear, which lead to the trios advantage rapidly descending to around the 40 second mark thanks to the work of Visma | Lease a Bike.
A sight to behold into the last 10 kilometres as former world champion and double Olympic champion, Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) took to the front of the peloton, perhaps for some extra efforts as he ramps up his preparation for the world championships in Rwanda as well as for the efforts of his teammate, the young American Luke Lamperti.
Somehow, the breakaway was still being dangled in front of the peloton with the margin at just 10 seconds, as the cooperation between the riders in the trio ahead faltered, with them attacking each other.
A disaster for stage 1's second place, Tord Gudmestad (Decathlon AG2R) occurred where he suffered an unfortunate puncture in the last 3 kilometres, with little road left for the Norwegian to come back.
The catch was made within the last 3 kilometres, where then soon after a crash occurred within the peloton, with the biggest contender involved, Thymen Arensman (Ineos).
Heading into the final kilometres it was a technical narrow affair in slippery conditions in Stowmarket and it was Olav Kooij who blasted to victory ahead of Tom Crabbe (Flanders Baloise) in second and Samuel Watson (Ineos) in third.
