Ronde van Vlaanderen

Yesterday we rode the Tour of Flanders Sportif (the 140km version) and all that I can say is that I have a hundred times more respect for these pro riders after understanding what it’s like to ride over these cobbles and how they pummel the bike and body. Some of the climbs such as the Koppenberg or the Paterberg have a gradient of over 20% and it literally takes double the amount of effort to push over the cobbles. The pavé impedes your momentum and the instant you let up on the pedals they stop you dead in your tracks. The odd time you’ll find a smooth line of pavement or grass on the side of the road which is an enormous relief. The 18% climbs which are paved seem like they’re flat compared to the cobbled ones. The climbs aren’t necessarily the difficult sections either. It’s the descents at 50km/hr with the cobbles rattling your brains out and cramping your fingers which can be the most painful. And from what I’m told, these are only baby cobbles. If these don’t break your bike in half, then the pavé in Paris-Roubaix will.

The Crashes

After riding the course yesterday I’m astounded there aren’t more crashes in races like this. I was gutted to see Cancellara caught up in such a silly accident which will put him out of the remainder fo the Classics with a reported triple fracture of his collarbone. GreenEDGE’s leader Sebastiaan Langeveld suffered a similar fate when he ran out of road and had to jump onto the bike lane where a spectator panicked and ran right across his path to break his collarbone. After watching the replay a few times I can’t say that this one was anyone’s fault. Just a classic example of when you should stay still in the face of oncoming traffic moving faster than you. Matt White told me that Langeveld was going 83km/hr when he went down. He’s now in the hospital seeing the best collarbone specialist in Belgium.

The Course

There was no mistaking that this popular win for Belgium with Boonen winning his third Tour of Flanders. Being amongst it all was a bigger sight than a Grand Finals match or the World Championships. The organisers estimated a million people were on the course and it was nearly impossible to get near the front row on the roadside. We watched the race by having breakfast in the beautiful city of Brugge and mingling around the team bus area and startline. We then drove to the Kwaremont and were fortunate enough to get a VIP tickets to watch the race with food, drinks, and dozens of televisions before the peloton came pounding past us three times.

As a spectator on the course, the village set up on the Kwaremont was excellent. For those of you not familiar with the changes, the Muur van Geraardsbergen (also known as the Kapelmuur, or Muur) was dropped from the race to provide more “commercial opportunities” for the organisers (i.e. being able to set up a marquee tent and charge admission). This isn’t as bad as many seemed to imply. There were thousands of people watching the race for free along the roadside while others were able to experience the race with food, drinks and live coverage in relative comfort (and run outside to see the race come by). I did however feel the absence of the Bosberg and seeing the atmosphere of the Muur with the mountain of fans piled on top of each other with the church at the top. Many Belgians I asked seemed indifferent to the course change as Tommeke won and that was all that mattered today!

Was the course selective enough? Well we haven’t seen a bunch sprint for 4th place at Flanders in quite a while, but regardless of the new course route I’m sure the podium would have stayed the same.

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