Male Team 18 Oct
Ronde van Vlaanderen
243.3 Kilometers
As Paris-Roubaix was cancelled just before the restart of the Northern Classica campaign, the Ronde van Vlaanderen turned into the final Monument of this strange 2020 season, and also, to some extent, part of the ‘Super Sunday’ of this autumn rush, its two races sharing the day with a big mountain stage in the Giro d’Italia. Because, after all, there’s no race with fans as passionate as Belgians are about ‘De Ronde’ – even if this time, the organisers have asked them, as it has to be the case in these challenging times, to stay at home.
Trying to make their way into a packed TV schedule, the Tour of Flanders for 2020 will be shorter than in previous occassions: 244km, starting in Antwerpen and finishing in Oudenaarde. As in the last few editions, there will be three different loops, starting with each of the climbs to the Oude Kwaremont, main point of a race featuring 17 climbs -ten of which will be cobbled- and five ‘pavé’ sectors.
The race always started to get harder at the succession of climbs to Eikenberg, Wolvenberg and Leberg (138 > 150km), with three cobbled sections in that short span, and really gets a selection after the second ascent to the Kwaremont (189km), combined in the last two loops with the Paterberg (192km). After that brutal, dual ascent, the race heads towards the steep Koppenberg (199km), with its maximum slopes of 20%, and the short, technical Taaienberg (207km), which, together with the decisive OK – P (227 / 230km), will decide the race at what has already become an iconic, long finishing straight in ¡Oudenaarde.