The 2016 Tour of Qatar was a road cycling stage race that took place in

Qatar Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...

between 8 and 12 February 2016. It was organised by the

Amaury Sport Organisation The Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) is part of the French media group Éditions Philippe Amaury. It organises the Tour de France and other cycling races, as well as golf, running, sailing and off-road motorsport events. The president of ASO is Je ...

(ASO), the organisers of the

Tour de France The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage bicycle race primarily held in France, while also occasionally passing through nearby countries. Like the other Grand Tours (the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a España), it consists ...

and was rated as a 2.HC event as part of the

2016 UCI Asia Tour The 2016 UCI Asia Tour was the 12th season of the UCI Asia Tour. The season began on 20 February 2016 with the Le Tour de Filipinas and ended on 2 October 2016 with the Tour of Almaty. The points leader, based on the cumulative results of previous ...

. It was the 15th edition of the

Tour of Qatar The Tour of Qatar was an annual professional cycling stage race held in Qatar. First organized in 2002, the event was part of the UCI Asia Tour until 2016. The 2017 edition was to have seen the event upgraded to the UCI World Tour for the firs ...

The race consisted of five stages. It began in

Dukhan Dukhan ( ar, دخان) is a city in the western municipality of Al-Shahaniya in the State of Qatar. It is approximately west of the capital, Doha. Dukhan is administrated by Qatar's state oil agency QatarEnergy and is the site of the first oi ...

and ended in

Doha Doha ( ar, الدوحة, ad-Dawḥa or ''ad-Dōḥa'') is the capital city and main financial hub of Qatar. Located on the Persian Gulf coast in the east of the country, north of Al Wakrah and south of Al Khor (city), Al Khor, it is home to m ...

. The Tour of Qatar puts unusual demands on riders: it has no significant climbs, but almost every stage is affected by strong

crosswind A crosswind is any wind that has a perpendicular component to the line or direction of travel. This affects the aerodynamics of many forms of transport. Moving non-parallel to the wind's direction creates a crosswind component on the object and th ...

s. These conditions make the race ideal preparation for the

spring classics The classic cycle races are the most prestigious one-day professional road cycling races in the international calendar. Some of these events date back to the 19th century. They are normally held at roughly the same time each year. The five most ...

season, so many prominent classics riders were present. The champion of the

2015 Tour of Qatar The 2015 Tour of Qatar was the 14th edition of the Tour of Qatar cycling stage race. It was organised by the Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), the organisers of the Tour de France. The race was rated as a 2.HC event, the second highest rating an ...

was

Niki Terpstra Niki Terpstra (; born 18 May 1984) is a Dutch racing cyclist, who rides for UCI ProTeam . He is the brother of fellow racing cyclist Mike Terpstra. He is the third Dutch cyclist to have won both of the cobbled Monument spring classics, Paris–R ...

(), but his team was not invited to the event for disciplinary reasons. The race was won by

Mark Cavendish Mark Simon Cavendish (born 21 May 1985) is a Manx professional road racing cyclist who currently rides for UCI WorldTeam . As a track cyclist he specialises in the madison, points race, and scratch race disciplines; as a road racer he is a ...

(). This was his second victory, following the 2013 edition. He won Stage 1 and finished second on the second and fifth stages.

Alexander Kristoff Alexander Kristoff (born 5 July 1987) is a Norwegian professional road bicycle racer, who currently rides for UCI WorldTeam . He won the Norwegian National Road Race Championships in 2007 and 2011. His biggest victories have been the 2014 Milan ...

() won three other stages, with

Edvald Boasson Hagen Edvald Boasson Hagen (born 17 May 1987) is a Norwegian professional road racing cyclist, who rides for UCI ProTeam . He was ranked as no. 3 in the world by UCI as of 31 August 2009, when he was 22 years old. He is known as an all-rounder, havin ...

() winning the time trial but losing time to a puncture on the fourth stage.

Teams

Eighteen teams were invited to take part in the race. Eight of these were

UCI WorldTeam A UCI WorldTeam (2015–present), previously UCI ProTeam (2005–2014), is the term used by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) to name a cycling team of the highest category in professional road cycling, the UCI World Tour or UCI ProTour ...

s; eight were UCI Professional Continental teams; two were UCI Continental teams. The WorldTeam , which had won eight of the previous ten editions, including the 2015 edition with

, was not invited. Although

Wilfried Peeters Wilfried Peeters (born 10 July 1964 in Mol) is a former Belgian professional road bicycle racer. Nowadays, he is sportif director of the Quick Step team. During his cycling-career, he was a major help for Johan Museeuw in classics such as the ...

, a ''

directeur sportif A ''directeur sportif'' (French for sporting director, although the original French term is often used in English-language media; plural ''directeurs sportifs'') is a person directing a cycling team during a road bicycle racing event. It is se ...

'' with the team, had suggested that the team had chosen not to take part for sporting reasons, it was suggested in the days before the race that the president of the Qatar Cycling Federation, Sheikh Khalid Bin Ali Al-Thani, had declined to invite the team because riders had failed to attend podium ceremonies promptly after winning stages in previous editions.

Route

Stages

Stage 1

8 February –

Al Khor Al Khor ( ar, الخور; also spelled ''Al Khawr''), officially Al Khor and Al Thakhira, is a municipality in coastal northeastern Qatar. Al Khor City, the municipal seat, is located in the northeast coast of Qatar, around from the capital, ...

Corniche,

Stage 2

9 February –

to Doha,

Stage 3

10 February –

Lusail Lusail ( ar, لوسيل, , ) is the second-largest city in Qatar, located on the coast, in the southern part of the municipality of Al Daayen. Lusail is located about north of the city centre of Doha, just north of the West Bay Lagoon, on over ...

, (

ITT ITT may refer to: Communication * Infantry-Tank Telephone, a device allowing infantrymen to speak to the occupants of armoured vehicles. Mathematics *Intuitionistic type theory, other name of Martin-Löf Type Theory *Intensional type theory B ...

)

Stage 4

11 February –

Al Zubara Fort Al Zubara Fort ( ar, حصن الزبارة), also known as Fort Zubara(h), Zubara(h) Fort, Al Zubarah Fort, or Az Zubara(h) Fort, is a historic Qatari military fortress built under the oversight of Sheikh Abdullah bin Jassim Al Thani in 1938. ...

Madinat ash Shamal Madinat ash Shamal ( ar, الشمال) is the capital city of the municipality of Al Shamal in Qatar. Located more than north of Qatar's capital Doha, the city was delimited in 1988 and shares its boundaries with Ar Ru'ays to the east and Abu ...

Stage 5

Classification leadership table

References

External links

* {{Tour of Qatar

2016 File:2016 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Bombed-out buildings in Ankara following the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt; the Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, impeachment trial of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff; Damaged houses duri ...