The Ronde Van Vlaanderen is the 2nd monument of the season and Sam Bewley can make it a 2/2 today. Together with Burghardt and Cancellara, the Kiwi is the top favourite here.
Amex and Bpost hold up the PCT flag and actually should be considered to be within the very best with their leaders.
Only 4 riders in the breakaway. This is going to be a hard time with 240km to go. Horton Gjølberg Kozhatayev Kastrantas
100km later Greek champion Kastrantas leads the break over the first cobbles of the day. Many more to follow now.
The peloton allowed them a gap of ~9min but is slowly coming closer again.
Responsible for this is mainly Oz Cycling and Red Bull, while Becherovka is quite calm at the moment.
Very early. Actually on the 2nd section of the day only, we see the first attack. Kruijswijk goes on the Huisepontweg and even though Bpost and Becherovka are also working a bit now, he quickly is allowed a nice gap.
A bit less than 30km solo and he bridged the 7min gap! Pretty impressive.
6min are left now with under 100km to go.
Mainly Bpost always highered the pace on the cobbles and so we have a early selection at the Kruisberg with 75km to go. Only 25 riders are in this first group where many leaders are doing the pace themselves now as team mates are rare in that group for most riders. The group includes:
Cancellara
Bewley
Stybar
Polnicky
Burghardt
Visconti
Grivko
Blythe
Vanspeybrouck
Bockmans
Vansummeren
Albert
De Vreese
Stallaert
Fouquet
Franzoi
Nolf
Sibilla
Kamyshev
Baugnies
Zepuntke
Gusev
Vanbilsen
Kump
Senechal
So while Cancellara already is isolated early, Burghardt (2) and Bewley (1) have at least a bit support. Impressive though by Bpost. 7/8 riders are still in there and clearly are in a good position now. They really have shown the PT teams here how to ride the cobbles.
Also mentionable the Metinvest duo Nolf/Sibilla, who both made it.
And to make Bpost domination even more impressive the only rider, who lost contact is Naesen. And he is actually following next already with just a small gap. Together with Atkins and Zhupa. 2 more team mates for Bewley.
This image reminds me on the Boonen era in his Pokerstars days. This year though it`s the work in the dropped rider group. Their leader is most probably Kluge
who missed the split. Also in this group: Sieberg Teunissen Fenn Kristoff Altur Breschel Lhotellerie Sinkeldam Gaudin Insausti David Schlechter Jacobs
The pace in that 2nd group is very high as they try to make it back. This leads to another selection as the best 20 riders distance the next couple of helpers mainly. Some decent cobblers as well though have been dropped and probably lost the race now like Van Keirsbulck, Puccio, Kurth, Ringheim, Lampaert or Schlechter.
Teunissen, Kristoff, Kluge and Sieberg make the jump to the first group. Huge effort by those.
But the next cobbles sees another selection and all 4 find themselves again in the dropped group as they have been too far behind after just joining.
Group 1
Group 2
Later Groups
Cancellara
Sieberg
Fenn
Bewley
Kluge
Altur
Polnicky
Teunissen
Breschel
Burghardt
Kristoff
Lhotellerie
Visconti
Kamyshev
Sinkeldam
Grivko
Franzoi
Gaudin
Vanspeybrouck
Vanbilsen
Insausti
Albert
Vansummeren
David
Stallaert
De Vreese
Schlechter
Nolf
Bockmans
Jacobs
Sibilla
Fouquet
Blythe
Stybar
Baugnies
Kump
Zepuntke
Gusev
Senechal
Kruijswijk
Kozhatayev
As you see parts of the breakaway are caught including Kruijswijk. Also Bpost got reduced a lot while the Oz support is still going quite strong and leading the group now actually. Only rider left a bit in front is Horton. Though just a couple of meters.
And just after this selection a huge attack. Top favourite Bewley starts his goal of winning the Ronde! 55km to the finish! This is going to be a long way left.
No one can react immediately. Horton tried for a second but realized quickly, that this is just weird.
It took a bit but ~10km later more riders attack as the gap was still under 30s.
First was Burghardt followed by Cancellara, Blythe, Baugnies and Nolf.
Where is Bpost you might ask! Vanspeybrouck was in the last spots of the group before. So either he showed weakness there of was just badly placed.
Actually it`s his team mate Stallaert chasing this group at the moment together with Gusev.
The gaps still aren`t too big at the moment. A lot is possible with 45km to go.
No weakness. Vanspeybrouck makes his way to Gusev while Stallaert is a big ahead. But they will form a trio in the end chasing the top top riders.
In front though Bewley and he is faster than Burghardt behind him.
That said, Burghardt is faster than the chasing group around Cancellara!
With 34km to go gaps are becoming more serious. Almost 40s for the leader and about the same for Burghardt.
Vanspeybrouck trio is 1min behind Cancellara and have the same gap to the Senechal/Zepuntke group.
Franzoi, Teunissen, Kristoff, Vanbilsen, Kamyshev, Kluge group is beaten it seems. 5'30 in total behind Bewley and probably only fighting for the remaining top20 spots.
The Bpost riders have closed the gap a bit to the next. Only 45s are left despite having one rider less. Behind it`s more than 2min already. So the top9 is almost guaranteed. A bit surprising that Stallaert seems indeed the stronger today. Vanspeybrouck working for his team mate.
Often the Muur van Geraardsbergen is a race decider and good chance to attack for the race win. Today though Bewley already arrives here alone after almost 40km solo ride.
Burghardt not have given up yet but the gap is almost at 1min.
Last but not least the Bosberg. Also here Bewley is not showing any weakness and keeps the 1min gap to Burghardt. Both are going the same speed now it seems.
The most interesting fight at the moment is the one between those two groups. The later seems a bit faster but with 10km to go not having been able to close it yet.
That said, we see the front group is losing one rider now!
And surprisingly it`s the expected strongest! Cancellara struggles and can`t follow Blythe, Nolf and Baugnies! Big blow for last years winner.
Bewley though is the clear winner. After an impressive 55km solo he takes the 2nd monument of the year and is one step closer to one of the very best of all time.
Burghardt knew it was only 2nd for him and lost a bit more in the end after probably giving up the fight for the win. He though keeps his impressive Ronde consistency with yet another runner-up here. Next year try again it is.
Closer than you might have expected, Blythe takes a nice podium and shows that his off-season work paid off. Nolf though really strong today and was very close to grab it. 4th is still a fantastic result for Metinvest.
Baugnies with a good 5th as well but he was totally exhausted in the end not being able to fight for the podium. At least he won the PCT duel against Bpost.
Cancellara just being able to stay in front of the next riders. 6th might have been less than expected. Still a solid result. Stallaert wins the Bpost duel for 7th with Vanspeybrouck also beating Gusev. Though a strong 9th for the Russian and a good addition for Tinkoff it seems.
A long time no rider finished. Almost 6min down the fight for 10th and it`s the last helper for todays winner: Polnicky. Great result for him ahead of Visconti. Another rider with a good performance.
Albert, Sibilla, Senechal and Kruijswijk also in that group.
Zepuntke coming in a bit later solo as 16th while Horton as 17th with a nice showing as best breakaway rider.
Vanbilsen, Kluge and Kozhatayev coming in as last top20 riders ahead of disappointing Teunissen, Franzoi, Kamyshev and Kristoff.
3 riders only did not finish todays race.
As bonus a short video how the race was won: Bewley`s attack!
