The cobbles did not live up to opening weekend expectations.
The Omloop was bogged down by bad streaming and boring racing and K-B-K was
sacked by a snowstorm. At Het Volk, many of the classics specialists were
keeping warm in the main peloton and failed to strike an attack to pull back
the breakaway group. However, some of the Team Wiskota riders were present in
the attacking group and a sneaky Italian grabbed the win.
Chapeau! to Luca Paolini. Little Luca rode a
tactically smart race to bag his biggest result in the classics. Luca used his
big Belgian breakaway partner to stay out of the wintery winds and timed his
sprint to perfection.
Chapeau! to Stijn Vandenbergh. The Big Belgian showed
why OPQS is such a strong team in the classics. At 6’6” Stijn looked like the
stronger man in the break. However, strong he may be, sprinty he is not. He
couldn’t win for Oudenarde in the season opener.
Chapeau! to Chavanel I guess. La Machine was a beast
at the Omloop and I thought he had the race won with 40k to go. It was not made
to be and with a teammate in the duo ahead he was able to sit on the breakaway.
I thought Mimosa was finally going to bag his cobbled classic.
Chapeau! to The Penguin. Geraint Thomas is still
looking strong and is forming a coup d’etat within the Sky cobbled classics
squad. No longer is Eddy Boss the sole leader, G has thrown himself into the
mix. It should be interesting to see what Sky will do come the Monuments. He
was able to finish 4th at Gent-Gent just missing out in the sprint
for the podium.
Chapeau! to Greg Van Avermaet. GVA was the favorite
going into Het Volk and showed that he may have been the strongest guy in the
race despite missing out on the podium. Avi chased down Chavanel early on in
the race when Chapeau seemed to be gone.
Chapeau! to Jurgen Roelandts. The former Belgian
National Champion looks real strong this year. He also aided GVA in the capture
of La Machine. It looks like Lotto has a card to play come Flanders and
Roubaix.
The “Schleck of the Week” goes to the big guns of the
cobbles. Boonen, Thor, BoHag, and Pozzatto were all left as
spectators in the Omloop but all those guys had teammates up the road. Flecha
and Vacansolei tried but did very little to chase down the breakaway,
GreenEdge tried to help as well, but the biggest loser was Garmin.
The American squad was absent from the break and from the front of the peloton.
Jonathan should spend less time at Yale and more time on his tactics in the
classics.
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