Tricky weather conditions (changing crosswinds from 15-60kmh) and of course a challenging parcours will make for a tough classic. Many riders will probabaly suffer.
A group of eight riders breaks clear from the pack into the first lap of the circuit, quickly establishing a minutes gap when hitting the first pavement sector:
So two strong puncheurs with Schurter and Besada, another notable name with Stannard..
A few teams in the peloton ain't too happy with the early break and they keep up a rather high pace here in the first 10-20kms. This causes a surprisingly big split in the pack, as we notice more than 70 riders being dropped! Some big names with an early shocker here:
Thwaites even a further minute behind the 50-men-group, where Kulczyk - DMTEX is working hard to avoid further losses.
Back to the very front, where the leading group is getting smaller with still 160km to go: Afonso has been dropped quickly and now see Haller and Stannard crashing. While Stannard makes it back to the breakaway soon, Haller suffers from his fall and won't make it back to the leading six.
In the meantime, Laizer is the first rider to abandon the race. We have a few crashes from less prominent riders.
Stash and Farrar now taking command of the chase, with the escaping group 2'40" in the lead. The peloton is back to a significant strength in numbers (158 riders) and the top-favorite seems to feel fine, when his teammates are pulling the peloton that way.
A few more crashes happened in the meantime, with riders like van der Poel, De Vocht and Backaert as the most notable names. The latter with a serious fall and he has to abandon the race. Tough luck for a quite promising rider on a course like today's.
Anyway, the action goes on and we see the first big attack with now 25km remaining! The early escaping group has been caught a few moments before, so it's all about the favorites now:
Van Keirsbulck makes his move on the cobbles! Definitely a strong attack and somehow to be expected after his teammate Farrar pulled the strings hard in the previous kms!
Schoonbroodt and Gaday immediately tried to follow the top-favorite, but while they had a little gap on the peloton, they could not catch up to Van Keirsbulck. The recent action causes major splits and we seem to have found the names, that will fight for today's honours:
Van Keirsbulck leading the race with now 15km to go, with just a 17" gap on a 12-men chasing group with
Schoonbroodt Gaday Bush, Visconti, Harrison Drucker, Van Emden Vandenbergh Hugentobler, Wyss, Grand De Vreese
12km left and we see Van Keirsbulck growing the gap to 27 seconds!
No more attacks for the next 10k and as Van Keirsbulck is looking very strong with his solo ride, the gap is getting even bigger with now less than 4km to go for the leader:
45 seconds advantage for the top-favorite, who's impressive today. The first chasing group ain't much faster than the second chasing group and the riders seem to just wait for the sprint for the runner-up. Van Keirsbulck is bossing it..
..to the line: Van Keirsbulck takes the race with a solo-move over 25kms! His team made the work to control the race and the top-favorite delivered the big win, he was aiming for. Well done.
All the riders in the chasing group look pretty exhausted as they enter the final cobbled climb a few moments later:
Drucker with a nice position and small advantage over Bush, Hugentobler and Wyss.. all other riders are totally dead after almost 200kms with cobbles and crosswinds. The podium fight will happen between those few guys at the front of the group..
..and what a slow but tight sprint here: Drucker with a narrow 2nd ahead of Hugentobler and Bush! The trio finishes 32" behind Van Keirsbulck and established half a minute on the next riders in this finishing sprint. Especially Hugentobler with a notable result, being the best puncheur with less cobbled skills today. Thumbs up.
Wyss as 5th (and Grand as 11th) complete a great result for Sauber Petronas, while Van Emden adds more key points for Philips as well!
Gaday 7th ahead of a strong Visconti and a rather invisible Vandenbergh, while Harrison is the third WCC rider in the Top-10. De Vreese and Schoonbrodt complete the Top-13 with Horton and Colon rounding up the Top-15 more than one minute later.
