The first classic-edition of Dunkerque: the party flat, partly hilly parcours from Dunkerque to Cassel (a well known parcours, that already had been featured as part of the stage race editions) may see the punchy cobblers as the main contenders for the victory:
With just 125km to go (and the first cobbled sector coming soon) a group of 3 riders finally went for a gap:
Buckosky Gonzalez Cortes Bissinger
A few kilometres later (the race is quite action-packed so far) 4 more riders would bridge across from the peloton with now 93km remaining and this new leading group being two minutes ahead of the pack:
Veelers Feng Verhelst Kolev Buckosky
Bissinger and Gonzalez Cortes can't follow anymore, the general pace is quite high at this point! An interesting leading group, for sure: Verhelst and Feng both with some nice allround skills for such a profile here and Veelers as a still solid cobbler despite his age!
Just ten kilometres later, a next group with 3 riders attacked from the peloton, joining the leading group 66km before the finish with a 4'45" lead on the pack:
Marzuki Brynjolfsson Coronel
The 8-men-group won't becoming less interesting with the latest trio catching up!
Coronel and Buckosky are the next riders dropping off the leading group a couple of laps later then: 41km to go now, the peloton started to narrow the gap back to just 2 minutes with teams like Swisslion and Cerveceria doing the pace (60 riders).
He catches up to the leading group 30km before the finish, but the peloton (now down to 29 riders) ain't too far behind with still Swisslion pulling the strings hard in order to reel Kluge back in..
..which happens soon after (27km before the finish):
Zhupa doing the dirty work by himself now and also GCN (with Minoungou) providing some support for the chasing teams so far.. Kluge and the former breakaway group have been swallowed by the main group, that is at 29 riders with now three laps (and three cobbles sectors) to go..
The general pace made some first bigger names suffering:
Machado can't hang on anymore..
Drucker in troubles as well, a few seconds behind Machado!
Next lap, 16km to the finish: Kluge goes again!
Zhupa jumping behind quickly and so does Jacobs..
Jacobs could not follow though and both Kluge as well as Zhupa opened up a small gap on the main group:
Ferreira now as the next riders trying to go clear from the bunch and to catch up to Kluge and Zhupa with 14.4km to go!
9.5km and Kluge increased the gap to 27 seconds..
Zhupa still ahead of the main group by 18 seconds..
Ferreira could not stay clear, just like Jacobs - they are back in the group, that is reduced to 15 riders with those latest attacks.. just when Drucker looked like he would re-join, but now he's part of a small chasing group with Gatto and Riesebeek at his side (a minute behind group Ferreira/Breen)..
8km to the finish and also Zhupa could not stay clear from the main group, that is 37 seconds behind solo leader Kluge with the race settling down for a few moments. 16 riders in this group now:
The race indeed settled down for quite a while then and it's not as action-packed as in the first two thirds of the day: the first chasing group kept a steady (though not overwhelming pace) and Kluge did not try to fight his way to the finish all on his own. The German is caught by the main group with now just 4km and the final cobbles sector ahead!
Just 14 riders in the group though, with
Ferreira Stybar Darbinyan losing contact in the meantime!
Thanks to a slow pace now, the trio catches back to the leading group with now 2.5km remaining and the final cobbled uphill sector entered:
Kluge still at the front of the group with Kasperkiewicz, Vermote, Kulppi and Rathe on the further positions..
Darbinyan trying to move further to the front after re-joining the group.. Ferreira though sits at the back of the group..
Just one kilometre to go and there's still no proper sprint or attack going on. Positioning will become a big factor for those riders then and so let's have a look at the order in the group:
Kluge takes the victory ahead of Vermote! He went early, got caught.. went again, got caught again.. still finished it off with the win. A kinda slow final 5-10km of a race, that had some action-packed moments earlier on though.
Oviously a great result for Vermote as well. Hanging on with the best cobblers and some clever positioning prior to a slow "sprint" from a this reduced main group.
Rathe with a rather shocking 3rd place then! What a huge result for himself and his amateur's team and certainly an upsetting performance against some of the big favorites for the race:
Kasperkiewicz 4th ahead of Kulppi and Breen.. Not the result those guys might have hoped for, but the lack of attacks surely did not help them to achieve a podium today.
Veelers "outsprints" Marzuki to finish 7th - a good result for both!
The same goes for Darbinyan as 9th ahead of Taubel!
Eeckhout with a solid 11th ahead of Feng and Stybar.. some notable results for all of those three: given Eeckhout's weakness on hills, he may be happy to just miss out on a Top-10 result eventually.
Joseph (14th), Zhupa (15th) and Schoonbroodt (16th) with disappointing results - crossing the finish 39 seconds later..
Ferreira has to settle for an underwhelming 17th place.. Drucker comes in 18th a minute later.. Gatto and Riesebeek complete the Top-20 and there's quite a long list of DNFs (which you can check below).
