Gilbert. Boonen skipped the Tour de France to prepare for the Olympic road race, riding the shorter Tour of Poland instead. He crashed in the first stage and withdrew on the fifth with a broken rib,. He recovered in time for the Olympics, and came 28th. Boonen won the first edition of the two-day stage race World Ports Classic, winning the first stage in a sprint. He won the points classification and the overall lead after coming third on the second stage. One week later Boonen won Paris–Brussels. 2013 In January, Boonen spent a week in hospital with a serious infection after suffering a wound on his elbow. He returned to action in February in the Tour of Oman but could finish only 83rd in the General Classification. In March, he retired from both Gent–Wevelgem and the Tour of Flanders following crashes. He did not take the start of Paris–Roubaix when a fractured rib was diagnosed. Boonen won his first race of the year at the Heiste Pijl, an event not classified by the UCI, then was the victor of the second stage of the Tour de Wallonie in July. 2014 The season started well for Boonen as he took the second place overall behind his teammate Niki Terpstra and the points classification jersey in the mostly flat Tour of Qatar. His next feat came at Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne, where he was part of a breakaway of 10 containing 4 of his teammates and 3 riders. The breakaway made it home and Boonen had the better of Moreno Hofland in the sprint by a slim margin. He placed well in Paris–Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders, coming in tenth and seventh position, respectively. 2015 At the 2015 Omloop Het Nieuwsblad Boonen made the decisive break with teammates Niki Terpstra and Stijn Vandenbergh, along with Ian Stannard (Team Sky). With 4.5 km remaining Boonen attacked but was gradually brought back by Stannard. After Terpstra's immediate counter-attack failed, Boonen was unable to follow Stannard's own attack, and finished third as Stannard outsprinted Terpstra for victory. On 9 March Boonen crashed out of Paris–Nice, suffering a dislocated shoulder which ruled him out of the rest of the classics season. Boonen returned to racing in late April, at the Tour of Turkey, where his role was to lead-out his teammate Mark Cavendish. He was preparing in Turkey for his first appearance in the Giro d'Italia. He