Naturally all attention is turning to the centrepiece of the Flemish Classics: The Tour of Flanders. However, before we get to the startline of the Monument on Sunday, there is the matter of Dwars door Vlaanderen on Wednesday. The race shouldn’t be dismissed as a De Ronde dress rehearsal. This is a race with its own identity, and increasingly, its own drama.
The 80th edition departs Roeselare at 185 km and arrives, eventually, at Waregem – but the journey through the Flemish landscape is anything but straightforward. Two new climbs have been added to an already demanding parcours: the Hellestraat opens the account earlier than ever before, while the Onderbossenaarstraat, a flank of the Taaienberg with a deceptive 10% lower section, arrives with 77 km still to race. Twelve climbs in total, seven cobbled sectors, and the relentless double loop over Nokereberg and Herlegemstraat in the closing quarter. It is a course that accumulates its damage gradually, and then all at once.
Recent history has complicated the sprinters' ambitions here. Christophe Laporte won solo in 2023. Matteo Jorgenson escaped alone in 2024. But a calamitous 2025 edition stopped Visma’s run in its tracks – Neilson Powless (EF Education-EasyPost) capitalised on the Dutch team’s collective hesitation to take a stunning victory. The finales of those races were forged on the climbs, not bunch sprints. The question every year is whether the course is hard enough to eliminate the pure speed merchants – and this year, after Sunday's In Flanders Fields (formerly Gent-Wevelgem) reminded everyone that the peloton can catch attackers, that question feels as pertinent as ever.
Contenders
Wout van Aert
Nobody who watched Sunday's race could come away with any doubt: Wout van Aert is back. Not just fit-back-from-injury back, but properly back. The Visma-Lease a Bike rider’s acceleration on the Kemmelberg was the kind of move that splits races in two, and for around 36km he and Van der Poel held a peloton of sprinter-laden teams at bay. He came up a kilometre short of the win, but the legs were there – and, critically, the willingness to position himself well.
Dwars door Vlaanderen is a race that suits him well. It rewards riders who can punch repeatedly over short, steep ramps, who can suffer and then attack. Van Aert has finished on the podium here before and knows every corner of the decisive finale. But last year, he was shocked by Neilson’s final sprint. However, if the Belgian carries the same form into Wednesday that he showed on Sunday, he has to be considered a favourite. The only man who could match him on Sunday was Van der Poel, who isn't in the startlist for Dwars door Vlaanderen.
Van Aert was back on the front foot of a Classic at In Flanders Fields on Sunday (Image: Jasper Jacobs / Belga / AFP via Getty Images)
Mads Pedersen
Mads Pedersen’s remarkable comeback from a crash in January was stalled by a DNS on Sunday. However, Wednesday is a chance for the Lidl-Trek man to get back on track. He was good at Milan-Sanremo on his return from a broken collarbone and wrist. Dwars door Vlaanderen is the race that fits the former world champion perfectly, with its repeated puncheur's climbs and lack of a single decisive wall. His sprint will unnerve the likes of Van Aert, but that’s not his only weapon. Pedersen wins in ways that are difficult to categorise. He attacks, he sprints, he suffers into the wind and then surprises from it. If he arrives to the finish in the front group, he is very dangerous indeed.
Pedersen is coming back from a injury, but is still a threat in the big Classics (Image: Getty Images)
Jasper Philipsen
Speaking of fast finishers, one of the very best is lining up on Wednesday in Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Premier Tech). Until Sunday afternoon, the knock on Philipsen in a race like Dwars door Vlaanderen was simple: he's a sprinter, and this course doesn't finish in a sprint. Then he went and won In Flanders Fields from a race that Van der Poel and Van Aert had tried their best to shatter. Philipsen was there when it mattered, and that speaks to a rider who has grown beyond mere sprinting excellence.
Can he survive the climbs at Dwars door Vlaanderen? The course here is more selective than Sunday's, the decisive sequence tighter and more concentrated. But after his performance this weekend, anyone writing him off in a reduced front group would be foolish. And if the race somehow comes to a bunch sprint at Waregem, he will be the one to beat.
Philipsen won In Flanders Fields on Sunday (Image: Zac Williams / SWpix.com)
Tobias Lund Andresen
Tobias Lund Andresen (Decathlon CMA CGM) was second on Sunday, pressing Philipsen hard at the line in what his team described, before the race, as arguably his best form. The young Dane has the sprint, the positioning instincts, and – as Decathlon's chase work on Sunday demonstrated – a team willing to put him in position. He is the sprinter in this field who might benefit most from the neutralising mathematics: if the race comes back together in the final kilometres, Andresen's legs will be fresher than most of those who attacked.
Lund Andresen has enjoyed a strong start to 2026 (Image: Getty Images)
Florian Vermeersch
Florian Vermeersch (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) was one the race's most fascinating subplot on Sunday. He climbed onto the Kemmelberg with Van Aert and Van der Poel, held them briefly, faded, threatened to close the gap again on the false flats, and was eventually swallowed by the peloton. It was a performance of enormous promise and thwarted ambition in equal measure.
In the absence of Tadej Pogačar, Vermeersch will lead UAE into Dwars door Vlaanderen, and Wednesday's course should suit him better than Sunday's. He is a rider who thrives in the sustained rhythm of the Flemish Classics – he placed third at Omloop Nieuwsblad in February and has been consistently present all spring. The climbs here won't reduce the race to the same two-man duel that defined In Flanders Fields, and in a more fragmented finale, Vermeersch is the kind of rider who could find his way to the front.
Veermersch couldn't quite hold onto Van der Poel and Van Aert at In Flanders Fields on Sunday (Image: Zac Williams / SWpix.com)
Other contenders
The start list carries enough depth to make any definitive prediction feel reckless. Christophe Laporte (Visma-Lease a Bike) won this race in 2023 and is not a man to discount even in support of Van Aert; he was third on Sunday and could easily become a protected option if the race fractures in ways that isolate his team leader. Matthew Brennan, Visma's young British talent, has the sprint and the engine to appear in the finale and will be given latitude if the opportunity presents itself. Per Strand Hagenes was second at E3 and is another option for the Dutch team.
Biniam Girmay (NSN) won Gent-Wevelgem in 2022 and arrives with the hunger of a rider whose spring has been quieter than expected. Arnaud De Lie (Lotto-Intermarché) offers raw power if not always the tactical precision the Flemish Classics demand. Paul Magnier (Soudal-QuickStep) was prominent at In Flanders Fields before losing ground to a mechanical, and arrives with unfinished business. He will be surrounded by a strong Quick-Step team including 2021 winner Dylan van Baarle.
Read more: Back on the Wolf Tracks: Will Soudal Quick-Step regain their cobbled Classics crown?
A number of teams arrive stacked with options including Ineos Grenadiers through Filippo Ganna, Magnus Sheffield, Ben Turner and Samuel Watson. As do UAE and Lidl-Trek, who have depth beyond Veermersch and Pedersen. UAE have António Morgado, while Lidl-Trek have Jonathan Milan, Søren Kragh Andersen and Mathias Vacek.
Read more: Tower of power: Ganna eyes success at the Classics
Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe also have a strong collective through Laurence Pithie, Jan Tratnik and the Van Dijke brothers, Tim and Mick. While Bahrain-Victorious pair Matej Mohorič and Alec Segaert have been strong in recent weeks. EF Education-EasyPost boasts a former winner of the Tour of Flanders in Kasper Asgreen, as well as young American sprint option, Luke Lamperti. After Jorgenson and Powless in 2023 and 2024, could we see three American winners in three years?
Prediction
We think Wout van Aert will win his first Belgian Classic since Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne in 2024.
