Ryan Gibbons wins 2017 Le Tour de Langkawi

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Dimension Data completed its Tour de Langkawi treble Wednesday with Ryan Gibbons securing the first overall victory of his career. The 22-year-old led the race from stage 2 through to the eighth and final stage where he finished fourth

The final day 121km stage was won by Travis McCabe (UnitedHealthcare) with Anthony Giacoppo in second place and Nippo-Vini Fantini's Riccardo Stacchiotti third.

"Early on the team said this was a goal and the team has had a lot of faith in me," said Gibbons after securing the overall victory. As a first professional my first year, this is my second race and my first time to have responsibility and opportunity I don't think I could have ever imagined this … it is really special and a dream come true."

Gibbons joins Ryan Cox and David George, and teammate Reinardt Janse van Rensburg on the honours roll as South African winners.

For McCabe, the win caps off a successful early-season debut with UnitedHealthcare, who also improved Daniel Jaramillo's GC position to fourth place overall.

"Today was more based on instinct. I jumped with 300 to go which is still early but it was fast and I had to go when I had to go today. Henderson was really the only guy to take care of me, he dropped me off second wheel with 300 to go so I just punched it," he said.

The peloton split in half on the early climbs of the 121km stage, and Gibbons was briefly in the second group. But the cool, calm and collected heads of his teammates got Gibbons back in the race and ensured that the threat of a dramatic finale quickly petered away.

"To be honest, it was a relief, I think again my head wasn't 100 per cent in the sprint but with three k to go I was smiling, and the majority of the way to the finish and then the smile turned upside down in the last two hundred metres," said Gibbons of the finish, disappointed he couldn't add to his stage 5 win.

Gibbons also claimed the sprint classification at the end of the race with John Ebsen (Infinite AIS) the best climber in the race, Hideto Nakane (Nippo - Vini Fantini) the best Asian rider, and Isowhey Sports Swisswellness the best team.

How it unfolded

It was the calm before the storm as the remaining 97 riders in the race rolled out of Setiawangsa to get the eighth and final stage of the Tour de Langkawi underway. With the first climb of the day coming 10km into the stage, the attacks came thick and fast, but each and everyone was matched by the peloton.

On the approach to the second climb of the day, the peloton split in two with Gibbons and Dimension Data under attack from IsoWhey Sports SwissWellness and UnitedHealthcare. There was a regrouping before the 42-rider front group shrugged off the stragglers and by the 45km mark, had a 1:45 advantage.

During the aggressive racing, Gibbons took the maximum points at the first and second intermediate splits to also extend his overall lead. Jaramillo and Cecchin also took time with the former jumping into fourth place as a result.

The gap between the two groups on the road continued to grow and had blown out to over four minutes on approach to the circuits. The biggest casualty of the split was points leader Jakub Mareczko with the two-time stage winner unable to handle the pace of the chase.

The yellow jersey group entered onto the Putrajaya six-kilometre circuit for the first of six times with its healthy lead intact so much so that the chase group was pulled aside from the circuit to let the leaders through.

At the third and final intermediate sprint of the stage, Gibbons was first again to increase his lead. Dimension Data and UnitedHealthcare continued to control the pace in the front group for the ensuing laps. The second group was finally pulled from the race on the penultimate circuit with the riders timed at 13:48 minutes in arrears.

On the bell lap, it was UnitedHealthcare and Dimension Data controlling the race with the two teams boasting the fastest finishers. Once over the 3km to go mark, Gibbons secured the victory but having taken the inside line to the finish, was unable to properly contest for the victory as McCabe celebrated the win.

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