5th stage of the Tour of Qatar is 170 km long - and once again dead-flat and influenced by wind.

The stage's Break of the Day also turned out being a replay of previous stages with a bunch of the same riders going on the attack: Leezer and Pate, followed by Navardauskaus and another group of Millar, Sijmens, Sestili and Khatuntsev.


Unlike the previous stages, the breakaway riders managed to get a reasonable gap with c. 10 minutes being the top margin. But once again, White Bear Steyr turned out to be a rather strong team, and whenever they run out of fuel, the other sprinter teams would take over.


With 20 km to go, the break was caught, and exactly as we've seen on the previous stages, a split was created in the peloton. Croket, Bennati, Steegmans and Serebriakov all managed to stay with the front group, but this time, Boonen missed it. And just as it couldn't get any worse for the riders left behind, a rider caused a mass crash including good sprinters such as Weylandt, Sonnery and Brea. For some reason, B&O has De Gendt as their designated leader, and therefore, some of their riders went back to help.


Meanwhile, the riders started getting prepared for the sprint in front - and Kolesnikov from the Warner Brothers team decided to do it in his own way. With no team mates, he decided to ride away 'silently' from the peloton. Behind him, Bennati, Serebriakov and Rasmussen were in good positions with Croket caught a little further behind.


With 1 km to go, it's still Kolesnikov in front, but Bennati has caught up with him - and Serebriakov coming up fast.


... but Bennati is too strong and takes the win in front of Serebriakov - and once again, Croket did surprisingly well by taking third. It's not enough to prevent Bennati from taking the Leader's Shirt.


Stage Result:

1	Daniele Bennati	La Gazzetta dello Sport	3h50'05
2	Aleksandr Serebriakov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	s.t.
3	Lars Croket	White Bear - Wild Horse	s.t.
4	Sergei Kolesnikov	Warner Brothers	s.t.
5	Matthieu Ladagnous	American Suzuki	s.t.
6	Alex Rasmussen	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	s.t.
7	Rafael Rodríguez Segarra	La Gazzetta dello Sport	s.t.
8	Gert Steegmans	Rabobank	s.t.
9	Frederik Nolf	Festina - Seiko	s.t.
10	Jean-Patrick Nazon	M&M Cycling	s.t.
11	Steve Morabito	Festina - Seiko	s.t.
12	Anthony Lavoine	Festina - Seiko	s.t.
13	Aleksandr Bespalov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	s.t.
14	Angelo Furlan	Philips - Hummel	s.t.
15	Mirko Lorenzetto	M&M Cycling	s.t.

Overall Classification:

1	Daniele Bennati	La Gazzetta dello Sport	13h25'41
2	Lars Croket	White Bear - Wild Horse	+ 11
3	Aleksandr Serebriakov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	+ 27
4	Gert Steegmans	Rabobank	+ 32
5	Michiel Van Aelbroeck	Rabobank	+ 56
6	Mathieu Heijboer	Rabobank	+ 58
7	Jean-Patrick Nazon	M&M Cycling	+ 59
8	Maxime Vantomme	Philips - Hummel	+ 1'16
9	Tom Boonen	Warner Brothers	+ 1'57
10	Pim Ligthart	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	s.t.
11	Matteo Bono	La Gazzetta dello Sport	+ 2'05
12	Ian Stannard	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	+ 2'10
13	Aleksandr Bespalov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	s.t.
14	Alex Rasmussen	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	+ 2'12
15	Hervé Duclos-Lassalle	Rabobank	+ 2'15

Points Classification:

1	Daniele Bennati	La Gazzetta dello Sport		76
2	Lars Croket	White Bear - Wild Horse		73
3	Gert Steegmans	Rabobank		60
4	Tom Boonen	Warner Brothers		47
5	Aleksandr Serebriakov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne		43
6	Eros Capecchi	Rabobank		25
7	Allan Davis	American Suzuki		24
8	Sergei Kolesnikov	Warner Brothers		22
9	Maxime Vantomme	Philips - Hummel		20
10	Jean-Patrick Nazon	M&M Cycling		16

Young Rider Classification:

1	Lars Croket	White Bear - Wild Horse	13h25'52
2	Aleksandr Serebriakov	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	+ 16
3	Michiel Van Aelbroeck	Rabobank	+ 45
4	Maxime Vantomme	Philips - Hummel	s.t.
5	Pim Ligthart	Virgin Media - Caisse d'Epargne	+ 1'46