Tour of Oman

The Tour of Oman is a men's cycling stage race held in Oman each February, first run in 2010. Sprinters and punchy riders share the stages on the coast and in the hills around Muscat, and every edition since 2011 has had a summit finish on Jabal Al Akhdhar (Green Mountain), 5.7 kilometers at 10.4 percent. Chris Froome, Alexey Lutsenko and Adam Yates have each won the race twice.

The Tour of Oman is a men’s stage race held every February since 2010, with two years missed. Its stages run along the coast and through the dry hills around Muscat, and nearly every edition has been settled on one climb in the Hajar mountains: Jabal Al Akhdhar, which the race calls Green Mountain.

How steep is Green Mountain?

The climb to the finish is 5.7 kilometers long at an average of 10.4 percent, and the line is at 1,216 meters. The last section is the steepest, at 13.5 percent. The vegetation that gives the mountain its name grows much higher up; the road the race uses zigzags across bare limestone with no flat stretch to recover on.

Robert Gesink won the first finish there in 2011, 47 seconds ahead of Edvald Boasson Hagen, and pointed to the sky for his father, who had died the previous October. The race has returned in every edition since. Through 2022 one or two more stages followed the climb, and the rider who led the race at the top always went on to win it. Since 2023 Green Mountain has been the final stage.

Fabian Cancellara wins a first edition without a mountain

The race was created in 2010 as a companion to the Tour of Qatar. That first edition had five fairly flat stages and a closing time trial. Boasson Hagen won the time trial, but he had lost 1 minute 5 seconds on stage four, when he stopped for a natural break at the decisive moment. Fabian Cancellara finished 17 seconds behind him in the time trial and won the race by 28 seconds.

Chris Froome’s first stage race win, ahead of Contador

By 2013 the group on Green Mountain included Alberto Contador, Cadel Evans, Vincenzo Nibali and Joaquim Rodríguez. Rodríguez won the stage, and Chris Froome finished four seconds behind him to take the red jersey. The next day Froome beat Contador and Rodríguez in a three-rider sprint and won the race by 27 seconds from Contador, with Evans third. “It hasn’t quite sunk in yet that this is my first ever stage race win,” he said. He won the Tour de France that July, and in 2014 he came back to win on Green Mountain and take the race a second time.

Won by one second in 2012, then again in 2023

Peter Velits started the last stage of 2012 one second ahead of Nibali, who had won on Green Mountain the day before. Nibali sprinted for the bonus seconds at the first intermediate sprint, and race radio announced that he had finished second and now led the race. More than 20 minutes later the jury, which had studied the photo finish, corrected the result: Peter Sagan had been second and Nibali fourth. Velits won by one second.

In 2023 Matteo Jorgenson took the lead with his first professional win, on the climb of Jabal Haat. On Green Mountain Mauri Vansevenant, five seconds behind him overall, came past in the last 50 meters and gained four seconds through the time bonuses. Jorgenson sat on the edge of the team car’s trunk for ten minutes until the result was confirmed. He was the first American to win the race.

Why was the Tour of Oman not held in 2020 and 2021?

The 2020 race was called off after Sultan Qaboos died on January 10 and the period of national mourning was extended. The 2021 edition was lost to the pandemic. The race returned in February 2022, and Jan Hirt won alone on Green Mountain, 39 seconds clear, to take the race by a minute.

A stage canceled for heat, three shortened by floods

The fifth stage of 2015 was never raced. Tom Boonen said eight tires had burst on the first descent, in the neutralized section, and Arnaud Démare’s bike computer showed 50 degrees Celsius. After more than half an hour of argument between riders and organizers, the stage was canceled. Rafael Valls, who had taken the lead on Green Mountain the day before, kept his nine seconds over Tejay van Garderen and won the race the next day.

In 2024 storms and flash floods shortened three stages in a row, and the Green Mountain stage was run over 72 kilometers. Adam Yates won it by 11 seconds from Hirt and took the race from his teammate Finn Fisher-Black, who had led that morning.

Froome, Lutsenko, Yates: nobody has won three times

Alexey Lutsenko matched Froome’s two wins in 2018 and 2019, the second time with three of the six stages. Yates won in 2024 and 2025, the second by six seconds from Valentin Paret-Peintre, who beat him to the line on Green Mountain. The record for stages belongs to a sprinter: Alexander Kristoff won nine between 2014 and 2019.

In 2026 Yates, back for a third win, crashed six kilometers from the finish of stage three and started the Green Mountain stage 32 seconds behind the leader, Mauro Schmid. Yates dropped Schmid on the climb but could not get rid of Christian Scaroni, who had started the day four seconds behind Schmid. Luke Plapp attacked with 500 meters to go, and in the last 100 meters Scaroni and his XDS Astana teammate Cristián Rodríguez came past him to finish first and second on the stage and in the race. Yates was third, 44 seconds back.

In 2023 Matteo Jorgenson won by one second after Mauri Vansevenant came past him in the last 50 meters on Green Mountain, and he waited ten minutes to hear that he had held on. Peter Velits won by the same margin in 2012, after a photo finish at a bonus sprint on the last day went against Vincenzo Nibali. In 2026 Christian Scaroni and his teammate Cristián Rodríguez passed Luke Plapp in the last 100 meters to finish first and second on the stage and in the race.