Male Team 30 Aug - 05 Sep
Renewi Tour
1089 Kilometers 7 Stages
The race will be broadcast live on Eurosport 1 and GCN, usually starting at 1pm CEST – except for Monday and Sunday, which are scheduled to finish later.
There will be 10-6-4″ at the finishes of all road stages, while the intermediate sprints will use the traditional-for-this-race ‘Golden Kilometer’ format: the rushes in a kilometer’s space, with 3-2-1″ at each sprint.
The Movistar Team’s organisation has two overall wins in the race with Iván Gutiérrez (2007 and 2008).
It gets back its seven-day scheme – and also the original name it had almost two decades ago. After spending its whole history called after its main sponsors, Eneco and BinckBank, the Benelux Tour returns to the geographical moniker it was known as when the ProTour started in 2005. The change, however, doesn’t affect its essence, the race already well established as the biggest stagerace for Northern Classics specialists.
Other than some bunch sprint chances in Dokkum (Monday 30th), Hoogerheide (Wednesday 1st) and Ardooie (Thursday 2nd), four stages will be key to the overall result: an 11km ITT in Lelystad (Tuesday 31st); a lumpy course in Flemish Limburg, with up to fifteen categorized climbs, to Bilzen (Friday 3rd); a really hard circuit in Houffalize (Saturday 4th), with eight climbs that include 2x the Côte de Saint-Roch; and the traditional, cobbled showdown around Geraardsbergen (Sunday 5th), over the Kapelmuur and the Bosberg as well as the Denderoordstraat.