"It's fun to do it this way" - Wout van Aert enjoys leadout debut with Olav Kooij with one-two at Tour of Britain

As did Mathieu van der Poel this year, Wout van Aert experimented with being a leadout. At the Tour of Britain he led out Olav Kooij to victory on the opening day as Jumbo-Visma easily swept the win.

“This is the perfect start, we finished it very nicely. As a team we did everything well today. It is very nice to be part of this”, Van Aert in a statement issued by the team. “I'm not going to call the lead-out easy, but the work of the team put us in an ideal position. The plan was to get through the last corner first and second and we totally succeeded.”

Jumbo-Visma seemed to be in perfect control. Van Aert did the leadout for Kooij, who has re-signed for the team and has now been given proof of the team's trust in him. He took the win comfortably, with van Aert still hanging on to second place in front of Sam Bennett. With a whole six consecutive flat days which should end in a bunch sprint, the Dutch team have plenty opportunities to succeed.

“It's fun to do it this way. However, I need to do it more to see if I will continue to enjoy it," van Aert said of his successful leadout. "I haven't ridden Olav very much yet, but everyone can see that he is very talented. I am happy that we are here with a strong team. Hopefully we can still win stages.”