Tag: Tour of Flanders

Ronde van Vlaanderen 2016 Preview

The tuneup races are in the bag. Belgium’s biggest day of cycling is here. Sunday’s Tour of Flanders is the 100th edition of the monumental classic, and with several big names gunning for an elusive first monument win against two riders hoping to pick up a fourth career Ronde victory, it should be an entertaining show.

The Route

255 kilometers from start to finish, the Ronde van Vlaanderen is defined by its many climbs, most of which are cobbled. Officially, there are 18 climbs on the route. Many of them are crested more than once. The peloton will take on the challenging Oude Kwaremont/Paterberg double twice on the day, with the second visit to the difficult pairing marking the final two climbs on the profile. After the riders summit the Paterberg for the second time, it’s less than 20 kilometers of flat to the finish.

The Contenders

Hunting for a record-breaking fourth Flanders win in his final year as a pro, Fabian Cancellara is certainly among the favorites. There are several fast finishers among the top contenders, so Cancellara’s chances probably come down to his ability to power away on the late climbs using his incredible engine. Don’t be surprised if he pulls it off, even at age 35.

Defending champion Alexander Kristoff has his work cut out for him this year. He may have won some races in the desert at the start of his 2016 campaign, but he just hasn’t quite looked as strong yet this year as he did in 2015. He won the race last year from a surprising two-man move, but he has not shown much of that escape ability since. It’s hard to say whether he can pull off that brilliant feat again, and given the tough profile, a big sprint (which would indeed favor him) seems unlikely.

Peter Sagan, fresh off a second career Gent-Wevelgem win, looks ready to finally nab a monument win. He’ll be looking to force a selection on the climbs, but he can rely on his kick from a small group after that, as he combines soloing ability and sprinting chops like few others in the peloton, and appears to be in shape at the moment.

Greg Van Avermaet also brings a terrific combination of top-end speed and solo prowess. He didn’t race at E3, where he would have been among the top favorites, but his overall victory at Tirreno-Adriatico proved his strong form. With Daniel Oss as a great second, BMC should expect big things Sunday.

Sep Vanmarcke was having a quiet season until Gent-Wevelgem last week. Vanmarcke missed an early split but was able to work his way back into the mix, and then put in an attack that was reeled in only to make the final selection on the Kemmelberg not long after. The form looks to be there. And don’t underestimate him in a fast finish either—he’s steadily improved as a sprinter over the past few years.

Tom Boonen may be in the running for a record-breaking fourth career Flanders win of his own, but Etixx-QuickStep will likely look to Zdenek Stybar and Niki Terpstra as the featured riders this weekend. They’ve both shown ability on this terrain and the form looks good at the moment.

Sky has options too, with Michal Kwiatkowski, Geraint Thomas, Luke Rowe, and Ian Stannard all potential protagonists. Don’t overlook the Lotto-Soudal stable either. Youngster Tiesj Benoot and veteran Jurgen Roelandts are both riders to watch. Edvald Boasson Hagen, Lars Boom, Filippo Pozzato, Heinrich Haussler, and Matti Breschel are others worth watching in Flanders.

VeloHuman Top 10 Race Favorites

Winner: Greg Van Avermaet
Podium: Peter Sagan, Sep Vanmarcke
Other Top Contenders: Fabian Cancellara, Zdenek Stybar, Niki Terpstra, Tiesj Benoot, Michal Kwiatkowski, Alexander Kristoff, Edvald Boasson Hagen

Photo by Dane Cash.

April 3, 2016
The Recon Ride Podcast: Ronde van Vlaanderen 2016

Episode 37: Ronde van Vlaanderen 2016 Pre-race Show

The Recon Ride previews the Tour of Flanders, quite possibly the best race on the cycling calendar.

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Dane Cash and Cosmo Catalano dive into De Ronde van Vlaanderen, the Tour of Flanders, with a little help from CyclingTips U.S. Editor Neal Rogers.

Photo by Dane Cash.

March 31, 2016
Despite E3 Crash, Sebastian Langeveld Confident in Fitness Ahead of Paris-Roubaix: “I’m Recovered Enough”

After he left E3 Harelbeke in an ambulance, it seemed that Sebastian Langeveld’s Classics campaign might be over for 2015. The Dutch national road race champion suffered elbow, shoulder, and knee contusions in a bad crash about 40 kilometers into the race, an event that also saw Fabian Cancellara badly injured and forced to cut his own Classics program short as well.

But Langeveld, Cannondale-Garmin’s team leader for the cobbled races, was determined to make an effort at getting back onto the bike before the big one-day events came to a close; for a Classics specialist, this is the most important time of the season, and the 30-year-old couldn’t not give a shot. After skipping Gent-Wevelgem, he headed out on a training ride last Wednesday, and then he joined the team’s recon ride of Flanders on Thursday, where he was able to get a sense of his readiness to start racing again—and the scouting trip apparently gave him enough confidence to take on De Ronde.

Only a little a week after his E3 hospital visit, Langeveld managed to stay roughly with the peloton at the Tour of Flanders, finishing at the back of the main group a few minutes behind winner Alexander Kristoff.

The 264-kilometer Tour of Flanders is not an easy race for a recovering rider, but Langeveld told VeloHuman that just being at the race got him back into competitive mode, so much so that he was even a bit disappointed at not contending for the win despite only just returning from injury.

“You want to give your absolute best for the team, you start the season in January as the leader for the Classics, and then the last ten days I was twice on the ground in my races, so mentally, that’s not easy,” Langeveld said. “Physically, it’s also not easy. Two days ago I didn’t know that I was going to start in Flanders, so I’m really happy that I finished the race, that I made the kilometers, etc. But on the other hand, you’re not going to ride Flanders as a training . . . so a little bit of disappointment, but maybe in a few hours I’m happy and I can see it a little bit more in another perspective and try to see the positive thing about it.”

The long day on the bike gave Langeveld an opportunity to get a sense of where he is fitness-wise after taking a few days off following the crash. His assessment? Things are quickly returning to normal.

“I was pretty good until the second time on Kwaremont, which is a little bit normal. My last real race was Sanremo, and I was five days off the bike, so that’s not ideal towards a Monument,” he said.

Paris-Roubaix is just around the corner. Langeveld was 8th in the race last year, and started this year hoping for more on the cobbles in France. In pursuit of a result in 2015, it would obviously be important for Cannondale-Garmin’s team leader to be at full strength, but his day at De Ronde gave Langeveld confidence that he’s already back in shape to contend at Paris-Roubaix.

“I think for sure I’m recovered enough,” he said. “Wednesday was my first training and today, it’s a really good thing that I have the kilometers in the legs, and then Wednesday I have another race, Scheldeprijs, and then we’ll do the recon. And now I have a full week, I can also prepare mentally. Two days ago, it was all 50/50 if I was going to make the start or not. But if you’re on the start line in Flanders . . . these are the races where you train for it all winter. We will see next week. For sure it’s a race where I would like to do a result, but we’ll have to see how the recovery goes. As far as I can see, the body, I had no problems with my injury. So that’s a good thing.”

Langeveld noted after the Tour of Flanders that Cannondale-Garmin is keeping things pretty stress-free; if anyone is putting pressure on Langeveld to be at his best for Roubaix, it’s Langeveld himself: “The team is as good as the leader, and they also know that I was on the ground twice and so they didn’t put any pressure on me, they just said try to do the race as good as possible. . . . The first plan was just to start here and do 200 km. Just at the finish I was a little bit disappointed but now I’m already trying to see the bigger thing for next week,” he said.

-Dane Cash

April 8, 2015
Ronde van Vlaanderen 2015: Race Day Thoughts from John Degenkolb, Hugo Houle, and Tyler Farrar

VeloHuman chatted with some of the riders taking on the Tour of Flanders at the startline in Bruges to get some insider insight on the way the 2015 Ronde might play out.

John Degenkolb (Giant-Alpecin)

We finally have good weather today. Does that work in your favor?

I think it’s in my advantage and I like it when we don’t have super bad conditions. It’s good, I like it.

How does absence of Fabian Cancellara affect the way Giant-Alpecin will ride this race?

Fabian was always like an orientation point in the race, so it will not make it easier, for sure. For everybody, now we have to make our own race, and I’m actually pretty sad that he’s not here, and I hope he’s getting fine again.

Do you think you can beat Kristoff again if this comes down to a sprint?

I think so. That would be the perfect situation but we will see. It’s a hard race, it’s a long race, and it definitely won’t be a sprint like in Sanremo.

Hugo Houle (AG2R La Mondiale)

How do you see the race playing out scenario-wise?

Well for sure it’s going to be a small group, maybe one, two, four, a group of ten guys maximum at the end. I think it’s more open because Cancellara and Boonen are not there. So it’s going to be an interesting race, and it’s going to be funny to see who is going to take control, and maybe a group can go a long way from the finish and stay ahead because you don’t have one team controlling.

How’s the AG2R Morale heading into this race?

It’s pretty good team morale. I think we’re all motivated and will try to do our best. We’re not the big contender but that makes us stress-free and we’ll try to get a result that will be good for us.

Tyler Farrar (MTN-Qhubeka)

How is the team holding up with Edvald Boasson Hagen sidelined by a collarbone injury?

You never want to see one of your teammates get hurt so that’s never good. He was really our leader for the Ronde and for Paris-Roubaix next weekend. It’s definitely a blow to the team’s strategy but that’s sport and we just have to deal with it and come up with a Plan B.

What is Plan B?

Today I think Gerald [Ciolek] is going really well. The last few races he’s really been climbing strong. We hope he’ll make the final selections and be in a small group that sprints for a podium or even the victory.

What’s your role today?

We’ll see. I don’t think I’m going bad either so I’ll try to stay pretty quiet early on and hide a bit, and try to be the backup guy today. And if we don’t need a backup guy, I’ll see if I can lend him a hand in the final hour of the race.

We finally have decent weather! Thoughts?

Finally! It makes me a lot happier. It’s been a pretty rough Classics weather-wise and that really changes the dynamics of the race. When you get those horrible days like we had last week, it becomes more of an attrition thing. When you have this good weather, people tend to race a bit more aggressively in the finale, so the race tends to be a bit more explosive I think.

-Dane Cash

April 5, 2015
Ronde van Vlaanderen 2015 Preview

With E3 and Gent-Wevelgem in the books, the Tour of Flanders is almost here. Sans Fabian Cancellara (and Tom Boonen, though he would not have enjoyed the same level of favorite status as Cancellara even if he were here) the 2015 Ronde looks especially open, which should make for quite a race.

The Route

At 264 kilometers, the Tour of Flanders is a long one, and the arduous journey gets more and more difficult as the day wears on. The peloton will set out from scenic Bruges and head south towards the cobbled climbs that this race has made so famous. The route contains seventeen officially classified climbs this year, many of them repeat trips up the same ascents, as the course starts looping into itself and covering the same ground again for multiple visits to these famous hellingen.

The final string of climbs that runs from roughly kilometer 219 to kilometer 251 are the likely battleground where this race will play out. Over the top of brutal challenges like the Koppenberg, after already having been up and over so many of these cobbles all day, the peloton is likely to break apart. And if things aren’t already shattered to pieces by the time the peloton hits the final climbs of the Oude Kwaremont and the Paterberg, the attacks are certain to fly on the long drag of the former and the vicious steepness of the latter.

After the descent from the Paterberg, it’s a mostly straight run to the line, meaning that anyone hoping to whittle down the lead group is going to look to act before the final few kilometers.

The Contenders

It’s a wide open field for the Tour of Flanders this season, with four or five riders enjoying roughly equivalent favorite status and a host of others nipping at their heels. LottoNL’s Sep Vanmarcke is certainly among the top contenders. The Belgian cobbled specialist was 3rd here in 2014 and despite never quite coming away with that big win he’s been searching for in his career, he’s displayed the grit, the bike handling, the climbing chops, and the explosive required to make a bid for glory here. The results in the run-up races of E3 and Gent-Wevelgem haven’t quite been where he would have hoped, with others appearing stronger out on the road in both events, but this is the real prize for Vanmarcke and he seems like an excellent rider to watch as the final Kwaremont-Paterberg double approaches.

Similarly versatile is Zdenek Stybar of Etixx-QuickStep, who happens to also have a true powerhouse of talent supporting him team-wise. Stybar looks to be the best of the EQS riders for this race because, among the Classics stars on this QuickStep roster, he best combines climbing legs and a powerful finishing kick. But Niki Terpstra and especially Stijn Vandenbergh, 4th here last year and extremely savvy racing these roads, give the team options. Expect to see attacks flying from all sides late in this race.

Team Sky also brings firepower with their many talented stars on the roster, with Geraint Thomas leading the way. Among the strongest climbers in this Ronde, Thomas is on terrific form right now as evidenced by his win at E3 and his follow-up 3rd place at Gent-Wevelgem. Being able to rely on Ian Stannard and Bradley Wiggins will help. With a pair of Top 10s here already on his resume and a recent win in a race that incorporated many of the same climbs, Thomas has the experience necessary to take on this race as a top favorite and it would be a big surprise not to see him try something on one of the final climbs. The question is whether he’ll be able to shed his top rivals who might give him a run for his money in a small sprint.

One rider certain to be hoping that this race ends with a small group sprinting for the win is Tinkoff-Saxo’s Peter Sagan. Flying more under the radar right now than maybe he was expecting to be due to a general lack of results this year, Sagan might have a bit of an advantage that he doesn’t usually enjoy; so often, his plans are foiled immediately because all of his rivals are eying him at all times. This year, with the focus on other riders, Sagan may have a chance to make something happen the way he wants to. The form hasn’t been too bad, and this is a major objective, so he can’t be ignored even though he hasn’t been lighting it up coming into the Ronde this year.

After a crash at E3, where his skillset would have made him one of the likely top contenders at the business end of the race, Greg Van Avermaet might be flying under the radar a bit as well. But he seems to have recovered from his fall and he has been in excellent shape so far this year. 2nd here last year and a more capable sprinter than most, he may be able to look for the right wheels to follow this year rather than launching one of his trademark “almost-good-enough” attacks. Daniel Oss makes for a terrific teammate.

Speaking of terrific teammates, Alexander Kristoff will be in good hands with Luca Paolini at his side as well. In Katusha’s pre-race press conference, Paolini was very clear in his support of Kristoff, and that solidarity will be a great boon for the Norwegian. It won’t be easy to keep this together for a sprint (which is what Kristoff will need to win here) but Kristoff is tougher than most and with Paolini to help close down attacks if necessary, he has a fighting chance. So too does John Degenkolb, who may not have much of a history in this race but who has shown that he can climb well (winning plenty of hilly, intermediate-stage type races in the past) and ride cobbles well (winning Gent-Wevelgem in 2014 and taking 2nd in Paris-Roubaix that year) which are the necessary requirements to hanging on here. Given the difficult nature of this race and the wide open field likely to see constant attacks, I think the sprinters will have a very hard time here, but Kristoff and Degenkolb are the two obvious riders to watch in that potential scenario.

Jürgen Roelandts, who proved his great form with a bold solo move in Gent-Wevelgem, also packs a quick finish and that makes him dangerous here, with the surprising Jens Debusschere as an alternative. Stijn Devolder will head up Trek’s Flanders campaign in the absence of Fabian Cancellara. Cannondale-Garmin’s Sebastian Langeveld was a late addition to the startlist, recovering from a recent crash; he’s a great talent in unknown shape right now. Astana’s Lars Boom, OGE’s Jens Keukeleire, MTN-Qhubeka’s Gerald Ciolek, and a stable of young Topsport Vlaanderen talents that includes Jelle Wallays and Edward Theuns are among the outsiders who will hope to contend.

VeloHuman Top 10 Favorites

Winner: Sep Vanmarcke
Podium: Zdenek Stybar, Geraint Thomas
Other Top Contenders: Greg Van Avermaet, Peter Sagan, Stijn Vandenbergh, Jürgen Roelandts, Alexander Kristoff, John Degenkolb, Niki Terpstra

Be sure to follow @VeloHuman on Twitter for more roadside analysis during the race. Also, don’t miss the Recon Ride podcast, with pre-race insight from Sep Vanmarcke, Geraint Thomas, and Patrick Lefevere.

-Dane Cash

Photo by Mick Knapton.

April 4, 2015
The Recon Ride Podcast: Ronde van Vlaanderen 2015 Pre-race Show

Episode 7: Ronde van Vlaanderen 2015 Pre-race Show
The Recon Ride takes on Belgium’s biggest race, the Tour of Flanders, with plenty of insider insight from a few people likely to play a major role in the event.
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VeloHuman and Cyclocosm join forces again to present the Recon Ride Ronde van Vlaanderen Pre-race Show, with more insider knowledge than ever, thanks to interviews with race favorites Sep Vanmarcke and Geraint Thomas and EQS CEO Patrick Lefevere.

Photo by Ctankcycles.

April 3, 2015