Alexander Kristoff felt that he took his third successive Tour Des Fjords victory by a decent margin.
Speaking to the Katusha press office, Kristoff said: "I felt quite good in the tunnel but it was a bit too long for me so the last 1km I was really struggling.
"After that a break of 17 guys went away and we were lucky that Jasper Stuyven was riding near me so Trek had the same interests as we did in bringing them back. Katusha and Trek worked well together and managed to take back the break in the start.
"That was a very hard start to the race. I was thinking for awhile that I had lost the jersey but here I am still in yellow so I’m very happy.
"Boasson Hagen tried to put pressure on me in the last climb, also Orica-GreenEdge, but I always feel stronger near the end of a race instead of at the beginning, so I was confident that I could follow in the last climbs. I’ve done this last climb in the past and I didn’t remember that it was so long, but when I saw the finish I felt confident that I could win.
"Truthfully you never know as there are some very fast guys here but I won with a decent margin today. We’ll see tomorrow if I can follow on the climbs but in general tomorrow’s climb suits me much better than today’s in the tunnel. It’s more like a Classic’s climb and I hope to handle it quite well. Can I take five out of 5 stages? It will be tough but I will try."