Ronde van Vlaanderen/Tour of Flanders (warning - unmasked spoilers)

TheBlaaMan

Right so, its about time a thread was put up for this..........

Ronde van Vlaaderen, Tour of Flanders, Giro della Fiandre, call it what you will, the biggest day in Belgian cycling is tomorrow. It is always a great race, and none moreso than 2013 when Cancellara powered away from Roelandts and Sagan on the last time up the Paterberg.


Its hard to look beyond Sagan given his recent form and ambition - if he can last the distance and still be competitive in the finale; but last years winner will do his best to repeat, no doubt. Does Boonen have another win in him? Wiggins has been added to the Sky start list as a replacement (no snigggering down the back...) for the injured Ian Stannard. The GCN clip below details the riders to watch and does as good a job as any (and better than me) in summarising the main contenders.

The only Irish rider taking part is Chris Juul Jensen for Tinkoff-Saxo.


A few days ago, it looked as if the weather could play a part with showers and heavier rain forecast. Now, that risk seems to be negligible.



The Race begins at 9:15 and the winds its way south towards Oudenaard for the first few hours. TV coverage is Live on Eurosport from 11:30 which should be well before any of the serious action kicks off on the hills. The timelines for the day suggest that they will hit the Koppenberg between 2:15 and 3pm and the finish should be about an hour after that - so quite a different course to last year (when the Koppenberg occurred long before TV coverage commenced) and a lot of the climbing is now in the very last section of the race - all times are Irish, rather than local. There are highlights on ES1 at 1830 if you missed the live action, and again at 2130 on ES2 on Sunday and then again in the early days of next week.

Johan Museeuw should know a thing or two about the significance of the course changes for this year....

The route with all the hellingen/bergs are listed here http://rvv.pro.p.assets.flandersclassics.be/files/2271/original/rvv2014-elite-men-map-profile.pdf?1387197435

Bring it on.....

dastardly00

Spartacus ftw!!

Brian?

I've a few bob on Boonen each way.

MPFG

Sep Van Marke....

Muckers

Spartacus for me with the podium finishes for 2 of either Boonen, Terpstra or Stybar.

flying11

TheBlaaMan wrote: »

The only Irish rider taking part is Chris Juul Jensen for Tinkoff-Saxo.

Nope, Sam Bennet is also starting tommorow!

see here

Darkglasses

Jurgen Roelandts. He will win from a solo attack on the Kruisberg, 26km from the finish. If I'm right, I get to ban you all.

Craig06

Stybar is in good for and will be there at the end I reckon.

Raam

Half of the Quickstep team are in with a shout.

Glass Prison 1214

TheBlaaMan wrote: »

The only Irish rider taking part is Chris Juul Jensen for Tinkoff-Saxo.

Does this guy consider himself Irish or Danish?

CptMackey

Darkglasses wrote: »

Jurgen Roelandts. He will win from a solo attack on the Kruisberg, 26km from the finish. If I'm right, I get to ban you all.

And if your wrong will you ban your self? :pac:
Think fabien cancellera will do it .

MPFG

Did you see this guy with the penny farthing yesterday....love the exchange with Sean Kelly...priceless

porza.be/cm/sporza/videozone/sporten/v-wielrennen/RondeVanVlaanderen/rvv_randrepo/MV_140405_met_een_zeer_speciale_fiets_de?playlist=7.37770

emtroche

TheBlaaMan wrote: »

The only Irish rider taking part is Chris Juul Jensen for Tinkoff-Saxo.

Sam Bennett.

MPFG

Vansummeren is out ....hit an old woman and she is seriously injured according to initial reports

MPFG

Sep Van Marke down as well ..but up and going . looks like I might have jinxed him

MPFG

Sam Bennett out

DominoDub

Follow the route on Google Earth

http://www.velowire.com/images/blog/rvv/2014/RondevanVlaanderen2014.kml

Glass Prison 1214

MPFG wrote: »

Sam Bennett out

What happened?

MPFG

Glass Prison 1214 wrote: »

What happened?

Crashed very early on it seemed...

MPFG

Cricky Devolder down now

Glass Prison 1214

MPFG wrote: »

Crashed very early on it seemed...

Shame, hopefully he's not hurt anyway.

DominoDub

I thinks elbow pads are required for this :eek:

dastardly00

DominoDub wrote: »

I thinks elbow pads are required for this :eek:

You'd want be dressed up as Michelin Man ideally

Darkglasses

Sloooow peloton right now. Nearly seems to be causing more crashes than if they were tipping along at a normal speed.

Darkglasses

Sebastien Hinault who was just dropped is 40 years old this year, fair play to him. No relation

dastardly00

Darkglasses wrote: »

Sebastien Hinault who was just dropped is 40 years old this year, fair play to him. No relation

Well you learn something new every day. I always thought he was related to Bernard, and I didn't think he was that old!

dastardly00

Question: why do all the Director Sportifs drive the team car as well? Would it not make better sense for them to be in the front passenger seat.

Darkglasses

dastardly00 wrote: »

Question: why do all the Director Sportifs drive the team car as well? Would it not make better sense for them to be in the front passenger seat.

I'm not sure, just tradition/convention possibly. Not quite all of them do, I know one of the DS from Orica Greenedge doesn't.

I'll ask the main man Carlton on twitter now!

Darkglasses

Damien Gaudin! Loved his big attack at Roubaix last year. Bit of a monster

Darkglasses

Trentin (OPQS), Quinziato (BMC), and Eisel (Sky) have made a big attack, tactically significant given the strength of the teams.

Think 2 or 3 riders just went down and out. Isaichev from Katusha and another rider from FDJ. Speaking of which, Jurgen Roelandts is already a DNF, so I don't get to ban you all...this time.

gordongekko

Darkglasses wrote: »

Sebastien Hinault who was just dropped is 40 years old this year, fair play to him. No relation

I never thought he was related to you.

Darkglasses

Ahh jesus, Stijn Devolder is paying the price for staying so far back in the peloton. Poor guy, no way he's getting back on again.

Darkglasses

Devolder back on and riding after a hat-trick of crashes. This race really demonstrates how tough this sport is

dastardly00

Go Devolder!

Darkglasses

We have a select group together now, all the favourites including Sagan, Cancellara, Boonen, Van Marcke (!), Degenkolb, and a number of other OPQS riders.

manwithaplan

Shaping up nicely now. All the 'big favourites' in the select front group.

Edit - OPQS sitting pretty. Cancellara and Sagan might have to find common cause.

Lusk_Doyle

Darkglasses wrote: »

Devolder back on and riding after a hat-trick of crashes. This race really demonstrates how tough this sport is

Remind me never to listen to your predictions. No way he's getting back on....and he's back on!

Darkglasses

Lusk_Doyle wrote: »

Remind me never to listen to your predictions. No way he's getting back on....and he's back on!

Haven't been right too often so far this year! It must be all that tramadol :pac:

dastardly00

Ooh very interesting, the bigger chasing pack has caught the race favourites group. Positive for Sagan, negative for OPQS.

dastardly00

Cancellara has just turned on the afterburners!

Darkglasses

Goooo Sep Van Marcke!

Darkglasses

Vanmarcke needs to work with Cancellara, the chasers are too close.

manwithaplan

Absolutely brilliant race. Looks like it will be 4 at the finish. Anyone like to call it?

manwithaplan

Kristoff's race if he can make it across. Doesn't look like it though.

Darkglasses

manwithaplan wrote: »

Absolutely brilliant race. Looks like it will be 4 at the finish. Anyone like to call it?

I have Cancellara, Van Avermaet, Van Marcke, and Kristoff all in my velogames squad...Anybody but Vandenburgh and I'll be happy. Vandenburgh is easily the freshest of the lot, I actually think he'll win it.

manwithaplan

Vandenbergh not doing a tap

Darkglasses

manwithaplan wrote: »

Vandenbergh not doing a tap

Hasn't done for the last hour or so. Terpstra has joined Kristoff, gives them a slightly better chance.

Darkglasses

The winner will come from this group of 4. I'm sticking with the passenger Van den Burgh

Darkglasses

This road takes us all the way to the finish, nothing complicated coming up.

manwithaplan

I'll take Fab. No great sprint in this 4 and he might just have a little more left

Darkglasses

Brilliant win for Cancellara, deserves it 100%. Did so much work to catch Avermaet and VDB, and showed brilliant patience and tactical sense to win it in the group of 4. Super racing