For the second year in a row, Olympic champion Greg Van Avermaet (BMC Racing) won the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. The 31-year-old Belgian beat world champion Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Sep Vanmarcke (Cannondale-Drapac) in a slightly uphill sprint at the twisting Emile Claus Boulevard in Ghent.
After the race, Van Avermaet admitted that he wasn't the strongest rider in the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad on Saturday.
"I was the smartest rider rather than the strongest," Van Avermaet said at the post-race press conference.
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Van Avermaet featured in front constantly once the race began heating up 70 kilometres from the finish, though he rarely took the initiative alone. The Olympic champion was glued on Jasper Stuyven's wheel on the Taaienberg and then hung on for dear life on Sagan's wheel at the following climbs.
"Peter Sagan was the strongest man in the race today. On the Eikenberg climb he was really impressive and I had to dig really deep to keep up. It's fun to race with him if you can keep up. I did feel confident because I was feeling stronger as the kilometres were going by. Sagan is difficult to beat in the sprint but it's not the first time he's paying the price for the initiative he's taking earlier in the race. After the finish he told me he didn't have much left for the sprint," Van Avermaet said.
When asked what Sagan should change in his racing style, Van Avermaet smiled. "We shouldn't make him too smart because otherwise we're not going to win many races."
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