Tour Down Under stage 5: Oscar Onley wins on Willunga Hill

Oscar Onley (dsm-firmenich PostNL) won a sprint from a select group of climbers to win stage 5 of the Tour Down Under ahead of Stephen Williams (Israel-Premier Tech) and Jhonatan Narváez (Ineos Grenadiers).

It was a tactical final climb up Willunga Hill, making its return to the men's Tour Down Under for the first time since 2020, but Onley was on top of every move and ended up timing his final kick to perfection, winning from a sprint between a group of four in the final.

While Onley took the stage, Stephen Williams will be leading the overall GC as the race takes on one more hilly stage around Mount Lofty on Sunday with the two riders equal on time, and the Welsh rider taking the jersey on countback.

"It’s pretty incredible. I knew that I was in good form coming here and wanted to do something on these climbing stages but against these guys, I wasn’t really sure," Onley said after the stage.

A grand return to the Tour Down Under’s most famous summit

Stage 5 of the Santos Tour Down Under saw the men return to Willunga Hill (3km, 7.4%) for the first time since the 2020 edition. In total, the peloton was slated to take on the climb twice during the 129km stage with 1,791 metres of climbing.

Four riders were able to forge clear after seven kilometres, with Casper Pedersen (Soudal Quick Step), Johan Jacobs (Movistar), Samuele Battistella (Astana-Qazaqstan) and Liam Walsh (Australia) getting ahead of affairs early. The escapees were able to counter attack the orginial nine-rider move of the day as that break was brought back to the peloton.

The race settled as the leaders built their advantage through the first intermediate sprint, which was taken by Liam Walsh, and the advantage pushed out over the three minute mark. Behind, it was the now familiar sight of Jayco-AlUla on the front, with the UAE Team Emirates contingent lined up next, protecting the lead of race leader Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates).

By the time the race hit its halfway point with 64km to go, the gap peaked at 3:30 with the fast average speed of around 49 kph aided by a visibly strong breakaway and calm winds along the flatter portion of the course.

For the next lap of the costal lap before the final lap and a half of the race around Willunga Hill, the gap began to come down slowly but surely. Another sprint-point came and went with an uncontested win for Johan Jacobs.

With 32km to go, as the first round of Willunga grew closer, Casper Pedersen took a flyer and quickly dropped the rest of the breakaway. Just as Pedersen was accelerating, however, the peloton began its own acceleratation towards the first time up the climb. Before the climb started, the rest of the remaining breakaway riders were consumed by the peloton as, Pedersen’s gap dwindled to 45 seconds as the gradient kicked up with 25km left to race.

At the summit, the Australian national team took up the reigns to try and buffer Luke Burns’ KoM lead with enough points on offer at the top for Burns to essentially lock up the competition. With only a few hundred metres left to climb, Burns, with the help of his teammate Damien Howson, was able to pull back Pedersen and then take the maximum points, virtually securing the win in final KoM classification.

A screaming fast descent off of the climb followed with speeds approaching 100 kph as the GC riders' teams queued at the front of the race in the run up to the three-kilometre final climb.

As the climb began a few kilometres later, UAE Team Emirates held onto the front of the race with Del Toro poised on two of his teammates wheels and the rest of the contenders swirling around in his slipstream. Chris Harper (Jayco AlUla) was the first to turn the screws for his team leader Simon Yates. With 2km to go, Harper was able to get a gap as Yates let the wheel go and Oscar Onley was the only rider to close to the Jayco AlUla man, forcing Ineos Grenadiers to rein in the small gap.

With 600 metres to go, and still a large group remaining at the front, it was Simon Yates’ turn to attack, cutting the group to seven with the race leader Del Toro hanging on the back of the group until he lost contact with around 300 metres to go.

A sprint looked imminent as the remaining riders began accelerating towards the top of the climb. Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-Quick Step) was the next to launch an attack as the road flattened out, but he was unable to shake Onley who did not miss a move on the entire climb.

Through the final corner, Onley accelerated and had enough power to resist a late push from the fast finishing Stephen Williams and take his first WorldTour win in spectacular fashion.

Nevertheless, the race for the Tour Down Under crown is far from settled with a challenging stage around Mount Lofty tomorrow and a general classification resting on a razor's edge. Not only are Williams and Onley level on time, but Jhonatan Narváez and Isaac del Toro also sit just five seconds behind the two British riders in the standings.

As always, the Tour Down Under will be in suspense until the end.