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Published on Monday, 12 August 2013 01:14

Eneco Tour Preview: 

The Eneco Tour starts on Monday and sees the pro peloton return to the lowlands of northern Europe for the first time since April. The ninth edition of the Tour see a whole host of Tour de France stars in action and it will be fascinating to see who can put in a good performance this week with the world championships and the Vuelta coming up soon.

The course:

The race sees the riders tackle 7 stages, which comprise a number of likely sprint finishes, a 13.2km TT and two 'mini-classics' type stages at the end that takes in the famous Ardenne climbs of the Cote de la Redoute, the Geraardsbergen and the Bosberg.

The race starts Monday in Koksijde in Belguim, a town that is known for its central role in the Three Days of De Panne race in the spring. The day starts with a short circuit around Koksijde before they leave the coast and head towards the finish in Ardooie. The Rodeberg (1,7km at 5%, which is part of the Gent-Wevelgem) is hit after 75,6km of the 175,3km, but the rest of the course is practically dead flat. The riders then hit a finishing circuit of 15.4km, which they do twice before what is likely to be a big, fast bunch sprint. The lead out trains will have to negotiate a sharp left-hand turn just before the flamme rouge but from then on, the roads are dead straight and we should see a very fast finish to the opening stage of the race.

Tuesday's stage is a tough day that heads towards the roads of the Tour of Flanders around the City of Ronse, taking in the Cote de Trieu (1.1km at 8%) after 45,8km racing and is followed by the Kruisberg (1km at 6%, partly cobbled) 7,5km further up the road. From there the riders head up the Mont Saint Laurent (1.3km at 6,5%, partly cobbled) and Mont (1.7km at 4,7%) before the roads once again flatten out as the riders leave the Flemish Ardennes to head towards Brussells. As they approach the capital the roads get hillier again as they tackle some of the climbs of the Brabantse Pijl - the Alsemberg (1.2km at 4%) and the Bruine Put (0.8km at 8,2%) with less than 14km left to run. From there it's a fast downhill and flat run towards the finish line in Vorst, but the stage finish is far from straight forward. The last kilometer is uphill with an average gradient of 5%! It should be interesting to see if some riders open up time gaps so early in the race on this pull ot the line. 

The third stage heads in to Netherlands and apart from the possibility of cross winds possibily causing a bit of trouble it is likely to be the most boring and straight forward stage of the race, almost certainly to end in a bunch sprint in Brouwersdam. Having said that, Thursday's stage four doesn't seem like it is going to be much more exciting as the riders head along a flat route towards Vlijmen, where we should see yet another sprint finish. 

The 5th stage on Friday is the 13.9km TT and if there haven't been much time gaps opened up yet, then this is surely the first real chance for some order to be put to the GC table. It's a short TT but this year the organisers have decided to change things a little and have made it quite a hilly course around the Limburg area, famous for the Amstel Gold Race. The riders have to tackle the Windraak and the Beukenberg but when they hit the top of that there is just 5.6 very fast downhill kilometers left. It should be interesting to see if the hilly course and shorter distance will mix things up a bit more than usual, or will we see Bradley Wiggins do what he did in the Tour of Poland and destroy the field?!

The final two stages are going to be fantastic, made for prime time TV viewing on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday's stage is a short 150kms, but it should be tough - the riders tackle lots of Ardennes climbs, including having to take on the Cote de la Redoute no fewer than 3 times, the final time for the finish. This could really see the race being blown apart and any time gaps the TT'ers made up on Friday may well go out the window once the classic specialists hit the Redoute.

The final stage on Sunday is no champagne swilling coast in to the Champs Elysées either! In fact, the race could all come down to this final, hard day in the Flemish hills. The Tour of Flanders may have dropped the Muur Van Geraardsbergen this year, but the Eneco Tour organisers have included it again and the riders are probably cursing them for it.. They start in Tienen and head west on flat roads towards the Ardennes. The first climb they hit is the Muur itself (1.1km at 8.7%) where they pass the finish line for the first time. They then head out on a lap of the 64.5km circuit which sees them tackle the famous Bosberg (1.0km at 5.8%, partly cobbled). After that they hit the uncategorized Hurdumont (0.55km at 8%), the La Houppe (1.9km at 2.8%), the Tenbosse (0.4km at 6,9%), the Eikenmolen (0.6km at 5.9%) and the Denderoordberg (0.7km at 8%, cobbled) before another passage of the finish line on the top of the Muur. After another loop of 25.6km which sees them hit the Bosberg once more, before a fast run in to the finish and the final obstacle of the finish on the Muur. 

The Favourites:

It's quite hard to pick an outright favourite for this race as there are so many riders who can make time on certain stages and lose it on others - the winner will be someone with all-round power and stamina, who can hang in there on the TT and not lose too much time, to put himself in a good striking position for the final two stages. Or, who knows, some of those earlier hilly stages might see time gaps open that can influence the outcome also. 

Ordinarily, you would have to say that the winner of the Eneco Tour was likely to be a time trialist, which would put Wiggins right bang in the firing line as the most likely winner. But this year's course is far more difficult than usual, not just in it having a hillier TT, but also the savage final two stages which could see the TT'ers get distanced. Wiggins though is coming back to form, and if he can battle and scrap his way to limit his losses on the Redoute and the Muur he may have just enough of a buffer to take this. But I think that is a big ask given his general all-round performance in Poland.. 

Lars Boom won the race last year and has targeted this race again this year. He has some good results in short stage races like the Tour of Britain, but I'm not so sure he will be able to defend his title this time around. His Time Trialling hasn't been great of late (34th in the TDF TT) and the steep Redoute may just catch him out. But he cannot be ruled out completely as he loves this race, is a previous winner and will have a strong team with him. 

In fact, part of that strong team is Wilco Kelderman and he may well put in a big performance this year. The Belkin boys have had a new lease of life since their new sponsor came on board and they seem like a really happy camp at the moment. Kelderman can TT well (won the TT in the recent Tour of Denmark), and can climb and scrap with the best of them around these kinds of roads. It is a two-prong attack that Belkin should look to exploit.

Sylvain Chavanel was 2nd in this last year and is in good form again this year. Current French national TT champion, he loves the roads of the Ardennes classics and will be looking to mix it up most days. He performed well in the Classica San Sebastain and if he can limit his losses to the punchier climbers on the Redoute he should go close in a 'home' race for his team. 

After that there are a whole host of names that could get involved - Niki Terpstra was 3rd here last year and Moreno Moser is in good form and will have the powerful Cannondale team with him. Philippe Gilbert is being mentioned of course - he loves these roads, these hills and isn't a bad TT'er at all. But he is winless so far this year still and his performance in the TDF was pretty awful. So I'm not sure what to make of Gilbert at the moment, but I will not be backing him. Pieter Weening rode brilliantly to win in Poland and is a good TT'er too, so he could be in the mix this week also. Then there is Simon Spilak who is having a great year, Bakelants, Roelandts, Kwiatkowski and Navardauskas amongst a whole host of riders who should make it a very exciting week's racing. 

It's a shame that Pinnacle Sports are the only bookmaker to have priced it up so far besides Betfair, as the lack of liquidity on Betfair makes it impossible to work out who is worth backing or not and Pinnacle's odds are not great (and very confusing!). If I can get some odds on Kelderman at big prices I'd be interested in an each-way bet, but Pinnacle only offer 3.45/1 (why not just offer 7/2?!?!) but it really is a very hard race to call. I would like to take on Wiggins though as I think some of those stages will be a little too steep and frantic for his liking and he could lose more time than he makes on the TT. Chavanel is one that I can see taking advantage of that though, and at 6.47/1 (?!?!) I might have a small bet on that. 

Stage 1:

It is a pretty glittering array of sprinting talent that lines up for the first stage, with Kittel, Greipel, Bos, Goss, Petacchi, Benatti, Van Poppel (x2), Swift, Farrar, Hutarovich, Demare, Labato, Appolonio and many more ready to do battle. It should lead to a pretty chaotic final few kms as lead out trains battle for the final push to the line. Greipel's Lotto-Belisol team will be looking to get things off to a good start but we also saw in the TDF that Argos-Shimano are excellent at producing their man Kittel, and when they do he has the beating of all of these. 

Given first stage nerves and the sheer numbers of sprinters who will be looking to get involved it is not one for big stakes tomorrow as there could be carnage, but Kittel is a pretty confident selection to win at 11/8 or bigger, with Greipel and Danny Van Poppel likely to go close to a top 3 placing also.