Arvid De Kleijn (Tudor Pro Cycling) doubled up with a second stage win in two days at the Tour de Langkawi, beating Matteo Malucelli (JCL Team Ukyo) and Gleb Syritsa (Astana Qazaqstan) on stage 5 in Melaka.
The overall lead remains in the hands of Max Poole (Team dsm-firmenich-PostNL) for a third straight day, with the Briton taking part in an early attack.
After some 20 riders, including last year's winner Simon Carr (EF Education-EasyPost) finished outside the stage 4 time limit, the hilly early half of stage 5 took the riders through the Genting Highlands for the last time in this year's race.
A four-rider break including Poole, Simon Pellaud (Tudor Pro Cycling ), Stefan De Bod (EF Education-EasyPost) and Ander Okamika (Burgos-BH) went clear, with Poole scooping up intemediate time bonuses to buttress his overall lead.
After the race was neutralised briefly because of a spell of very heavy rain, the four riders were slowly reeled in one by one on the much flatter second half of the stage - De Bod being the last - and a bunch sprint became all but inevitable.
US National Champion Sean Quinn (EF Education-EasyPost) attempted to tear up the script with a lone bid for the line in the flat, broad boulevards that made up all of the run-in, but was subbed in with two kilometres to go.
Polti-Kometa and then Tudor Pro Cycling worked hard on a fast downhill segment as the bunch fragmented, only for stage 1 winner Gleb Syritsa (Astana Qazaqstan) to open up the sprint early on the right-hand side.
Stage 2 winner and points leader Matteo Malucelli (JCL Team Ukyo) was on De Kleijn's wheel in the centre and closing fast, but the Dutchman kept his pace high to keep the Italian at bay by just under half a wheel.
"It was a hard stage, specially the beginning," De Kleijn said. "On the second climb I was dropped with all the other sprinters, but we started riding and got back on."
"There was a lot of chasing in the bunch but we had Simon in the break and that meant we didn't have to do that, which was good."
"Then the guys put me in the perfect position and I did a really good sprint."
Yet another sprinters' stage - the fifth in the 2024 race out of six so far - beckons on Friday, in the shape of a flat 123.6 kilometre run from Batu Pahat to Kulai.
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