Paris-Nice: Olav Kooij beats Mads Pedersen for the second time this week to win stage 5

Olav Kooij beat Mads Pedersen in a sprint for the second time this week. Stage 5 of Paris-Nice into Sisteron was a fast and aggressive day, but the Team Visma | Lease a Bike rider won in the final sprint.

The hilly day in the French race gave an opportunity for classics riders and breakaway specialists to have a go, and a strong eight-figure group tried taking advantage of the favourable conditions. Victor Campenaerts, Pascal Eenkhoorn, Sandy Dujardin, Pierre Latour, Alexis Gougeard, Dries de Bondt, Mathias Norsgaard and Mathijs Paasschens.

The beakaway was very dangerous and the peloton was aware, the gap never grew above just over two minutes as Lidl-Trek, Team Visma | Lease a Bike and Groupama - FDJ set a strong pace. The likes of Arvid de Kleijn, Fabio Jakobsen and Kaden Groves, potential candidates for the day, abandoned in the meantime.

The peloton lost men and so did the breakaway over the slight climbs because of the strong pace. The peloton had no mercy and ultimately brought back the front group with 10 kilometers to go.

There was no restbite however, right after a small hilltop provided a launchpad for Quentin Pacher to launch an attack. Brandon McNulty and Remco Evenepoel were also hitting the front; whilst Mads Pedersen and Laurence Pithie were involved in the action.

A bunch sprint though was to be as everyone regrouped. Lidl-Trek had the men and had another strong leadout. Mads Pedersen launched his sprint but just as happened on the first day of the race, he was overtaken by Olav Kooij who had a dominant kick to the line. Pedersen finished second whilst Pascal Ackermann was third on the day.