The 100th, Jubilee De Ronde

On Sunday the 100th, jubilee edition of the Tour of Flanders (Ronde van Vlaanderen, De Ronde – “the tour”), the second of the five Monument classics, took place. The first De Ronde was held in Belgium’s Flanders region in 1913. This year’s route was 255 kilometers long, over which the riders had to tackle 19 climbs (hellingen), 10 of them cobbled. Traditionally the race climbed the Oude Kwaremont three times and the final Paterberg twice. Extra difficulty came from the 7 flat cobbled sectors (kasseien) on the course.

I’ll draw special attention to the final climb, the Paterberg, located at kilometer 242, 13 kilometers from the finish, which is usually marked out by the favorites for the decisive attack.

So it was this year too, but let’s start from a little further back. The race hadn’t yet reached the decisive section when two favorites, France’s Arnaud Démare and Belgium’s Greg Van Avermaet, were already out of the fight because of crashes. The tension peaked 32 kilometers from the finish, when Sky’s Pole Michał Kwiatkowski, last year’s world champion, attacked and the reigning world champion responded. Belgium’s Sep Vanmarcke immediately read the situation, and the trio stayed together until the Kwaremont.

3 April 2016
100th Tour des Flandres
VANMARCKE Sep (BEL) Lotto NL – Jumbo
SAGAN Peter (SVK) Tinkoff
KWIATKOWSKI Michal (POL) Sky
Photo : Yuzuru SUNADA

But Kwiato dropped back on the climb, and Peter and Sep were first onto the decisive Paterberg; right there the legendary Swiss Fabian Cancellara launched his decisive attack — this was his last De Ronde, and he was fighting for a historic fourth win.

3 April 2016
100th Tour des Flandres
CANCELLARA Fabian (SUI) Trek – Segafredo, at Paterberg
Photo : Yuzuru SUNADA

But Peter had no intention of waiting: on the Paterberg’s 20% section he accelerated sharply, Vanmarcke couldn’t respond, and Peter began the final descent with a 10-second lead. Fabian caught Sep, but their joint effort proved fruitless.

Peter was firmly set on dispelling the myth of the rainbow jersey curse, and he triumphantly won the first Monument of his career, taking the top step of the podium of the 100th, jubilee Tour of Flanders in the rainbow jersey!!!

3 April 2016
100th Tour des Flandres
1st : SAGAN Peter (SVK) Tinkoff
2nd : CANCELLARA Fabian (SUI) Trek – Segafredo
3rd : VANMARCKE Sep (BEL) Lotto NL – Jumbo
Photo : Yuzuru SUNADA

Featured image: Yuzuru SUNADA/www.yuzurusunada.com

Inside post thumbnail image: Yuzuru SUNADA/www.yuzurusunada.com

Special thanks to the Japanese photographer Yuzuru SUNADA for permission to use his works in our publications.

Translated from Georgian with the assistance of Claude (Anthropic), reviewed by the Velorbola editors.