The opening day, a hilly stage, got off to a calm start before it began to crescendo in the last 40 kilometres of a gruelling 137.1km test in Essex which saw Balsamo and Norsgaard Bjerg follow Wiebes across the line with 3:30:17 and 3:30:21 on the clock, respectively.

Home favourite Anna Henderson of Jumbo-Visma attacked shortly after completing the first mini lap and held an advantage for over 30km before being caught by the charging peloton in the final kilometre.

"It was a pretty chaotic finish," Wiebes said.

"Because Anna Henderson was still in front, so the speed was really high in the last lap.

"We lost each other in the sprint train, but I stayed with Charlotte [Kool] and she put me in the wheel of Balsamo, so actually it was perfect.

"Then I started my sprint out of the corner, so I’m happy to take this win after good teamwork.

"I like it when it goes a bit uphill.

"It was super hard, but I like it."

These sorts of stages are usually typified by breakaways but that was not the case today as the two intermediate sprints and two queen of the mountain points were saved until the last 40km meaning there was little incentive to attack from the start.

A crash in the bunch saw three AG Insurance-NXTG riders on the ground including their promising sprinter Ally Wollaston of New Zealand as well as Uno-X's Danish rider Rebecca Koerner and Britain's Emily Meakin representing AWOL O'Shea.

The NXTG trio quickly re-joined the peloton, but Koerner pulled out of the race injured.

At this point Henderson was in cruise control and looked set for victory, as she held a 30-second lead with just 3km to go.

However, Wiebes had more left in the tank to surge across the line as she looks good value to win her second overall International Cycling Union WorldTour race this season following a Ronde van Drenthe victory in March.

Tomorrow's penultimate stage sees riders travel from Chelmsford to Epping over a 141km route.