HISTORY repeated itself on the opening stage of the Asda Tour de Yorkshire Women’s Race with Kirsten Wild sprinting to victory in Doncaster.

Wild triumphed in Doncaster when the race last visited in 2016, and proved her dominance once again with an emphatic sprint to take the overall lead on stage one.

Dani Rowe was active early on in the first stage as she won the first intermediate sprint and was second over the only categorised climb of the day.

Rowe, riding for the Great Britain squad in this two-day race, followed Georgi Pfeiffer of the Jadan-Weldtite Vive Le Velo squad over the Cote de Baggaby Hill 40 kilometres into the 132km stage from Beverley to Doncaster.

Rowe then won the first intermediate sprint in Pocklington before Trek-Drops' Anna Christian and Parkhotel Valkenburg's Natalie van Gogh went clear.

The pair led by 82 seconds as Van Gogh picked up the points for the second intermediate sprint in Howden - with Rowe at the front of the peloton to claim the final bonus second.

Wiggle High 5 rider Wild said: "This finish I really like. When I saw this finish again I was very excited and I asked my team if I could race and they allowed me.

"It's a really nice finish for sprinters. My team worked really hard all day and in the final they were amazing."

A roundabout just over a kilometre out caused splits in the lead-out trains as a handful of riders were confused by cones in the road, but Wild's Wiggle-High 5 knew the way to go.

"It was a bit chaotic with the signs, but I knew from the map and the time I was here to go I had to go straight," Wild said. "So we just went straight, but that put us really early on the front so it was quite hard."

With bonus seconds applied, Wild leads the general classification by four seconds from Dideriksen, with Barnes and Dani Rowe a further two seconds back heading into Friday's 128km stage from Barnsley to a summit finish on the Cow and Calf outside Ilkley.

Former Olympic track champion Rowe, picked up bonus seconds on the only categorised climb of the day and in the intermediate sprints as she rode aggressively early on.

"The plan was pulled off today," Rowe said. "I wanted to try and get some bonus seconds and to test the legs on a climb, even though it doesn't compare to tomorrow's climb."

Rowe spent Tuesday doing a recce of Friday's course, driving the first half before riding the more testing second part.

"I know exactly what's in store," she said. "I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not, but at least I know where the top of the climb is."