Marcel Kittel sent out a strong response to the critics who doubted him last season as he enjoyed a dream debut with his new team Etixx-Quick-Step, outsprinting Mark Cavendish to take the opening stage of the Dubai Tour on Wednesday.
Kittel, who replaced Cavendish at Etixx with the Manxman moving on to Team Dimension Data, reaped the rewards of a perfect lead-out to cross the finish line first in Fujairah.
The German star sprinter had an illness-blighted 2015 with Giant-Alpecin, taking just two wins all season, after dazzling in 2014 with 14 victories, including four stages at the Tour de France.
But Kittel, 27, is back to full fitness and says he couldn’t dream of a better start with Etixx-Quick-Step.
“I’m really really happy to be able to win today. I think it wasn’t everyone’s expectation that I can maybe come back like this,” an elated Kittel told reporters in Fujairah on Wednesday after being awarded both the blue general classification and red points classification jerseys.
“And also for me it was a challenge to show all the critics that I got in the last months and year – that said that I’m not motivated, that I’m maybe lazy – to prove that that is completely wrong.
“I’m super happy with the job that the boys did, the lead-out, better than I expected. I think we as a team showed that we are really strong. We have so much horsepower here in the team and I’m super happy that I can also get a win for them today.”
A total of 124 riders cast off from the race headquarters at the Dubai International Marine Club and traversed 173km to finish on the Corniche Road in Fujairah.
At 30km into the stage, BMC’s Loic Vliegen, Movistar’s Marc Soler, One Pro Cycling’s Martin Mortsensen and Skydive Dubai’s Soufiane Haddi broke away and opened up a gap of 1’43″.
Novo Nordisk’s Charles Planet and Al Nasr Pro Cycling’s Jesus Rubio Arribas caught up with the breakaway and the six riders maintained a gap throughout most of the stage.
They were caught up in the final 11 km and after a failed attempt to attack from BMC’s Philippe Gilbert with 4km to go, Kittel managed to get in position to claim the bunch sprint ahead of Cavendish, Giacomo Nizzolo and Skydive Dubai’s Andrea Palini.
Cavendish, the defending Dubai Tour champion making just his second road appearance with African outfit Team Dimension Data, said he was pleased with his form so early in the season.
“I felt okay for my first proper road race – I did the Cadel Evans race but this was the first one we were racing for. Team Dimension Data boys were pulling really strong the whole day, there was a strong group out there,” Cavendish told Sport360.
“I thought I could maybe get on Kittel’s wheel at the end, then this guy from Skydive Dubai, I don’t know his name (Palini), was fighting, fighting… he doesn’t do anything wrong by fighting, but if you’re going to fight then you need to stay on the wheel. And he fights me so I don’t got a wheel then you can’t hold Kittel’s wheel.
“So I got boxed by which point Kittel had gone. So I was coming the whole time, my form was good, I was coming the whole time, you just gotta jump you know.”
Kittel, who won three stages in the inaugural Dubai Tour in 2014, says it’s important to stay focused to try and grab more victories in the next three days.
“I try to stay calm now,” he insists. “It was really really good, I’m very happy, we will also talk tonight about it, we will celebrate this win but we will also stay calm. We have a great start here in Dubai and we can be relieved now, we got the sprint that we really wanted and we will see what happens in the next days and of course we try to improve.”
The Dubai Tour is tailor-made for sprinters with three of the four stages predominantly flat, encouraging bunch sprints, with the summit finish at Hatta Dam on Friday being the only exception.
Asked if there’s anything particular he liked about Dubai that brought out the best in him, Kittel joked: “Yes, that it’s so flat.
“Racing here in Dubai is always special because you don’t have that scenery at home. We race through desert here, through skyscrapers, it’s actually quite unique. For a sprinter, if you have three stages out of four that are really flat, this is more than you can dream of.”
