Wout van Aert grabs lead of Tour of Britain

Wout van Aert grabbed the lead of the Tour of Britain, and finally broke the general classification deadlock, thanks to a devastating solo attack 1km from the finish to stage five in Felixstowe.

This year’s race has been criticised for being too predictable, with every stage up until Thursday’s won in a bunch sprint by exactly the same man, van Aert’s Jumbo-Visma team-mate Olav Kooij.

With no time bonuses, the top GC riders such as van Aert and Britain’s Tom Pidcock were all on the same time heading into Thursday’s stage, only separated by count back.

Van Aert now has a slender three-second lead after his late attack into Felixstowe. The Belgian superstar, who won the race two years ago and is the heavy favourite to repeat his triumph this year, looked to be leading out Kooij again, as he did in the first four stages. But this time the 28 year-old launched what proved to be a race-winning move at a fast left-hander with 1km of the stage remaining.

”It is always tricky to make a plan like that,” Van Aert said afterwards. “When you can execute like this it gives a lot of satisfaction. Another great day for the team and [we are] really proud of this one.

“It came up as a joke-slash-idea and we knew if somebody responded, the bunch would still be stretched out and Olav still had a good chance in the sprint.

“We tried something else and I think that’s the nice thing about cycling, there are enough times when it is boring and you know what is going to happen. It’s nice to spice things up. It was a really special victory.”

Great Britain’s Ethan Vernon was three seconds back in second place, meaning he moves into second overall with the same time deficit.

Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers) lies seventh overall, also at three seconds.

The Olympic mountain bike champion will hope to take the fight to van Aert in the final two stages this weekend, both hillier affairs, in Gloucestershire and South Wales.

The eight-stage race concludes in Caerphilly on Sunday.