Seven days ahead of the religious one this year, Holy Week of the classic monuments of the North kicks off on Sunday: first the Tour of Flanders, then Paris-Roubaix, two races which last year saw the triumph, in an exciting , Fabian Cancellara who repeated the success of 2010. And the Swiss, who is still lacking in victories this season, is still the great favorite of the Ronde van Vlanderen, which has been held punctually since 1913 on the first Sunday in April. To try to prevent him from the trio of victories, which would place him on the same level as Fiorenzo Magni and Tom Boonen, there are his all-time rivals - with the exception of Gilbert who gave foirfait, starting with Boonen himself, leader of Omega Pharma Quick Step, who wants to make up for a lackluster 2013. Then Peter Sagan, the most popular with bookmakers after Spartacus who hit Harelbeke last week; John Degenkolb, pure sprinter who, however, proved to be able to suffer on the cobblestones and walls of the North, winner of Ghent-Wevelgem; then to follow Edvald Boasson Hagen, Niki Terpstra, Sylvain Chavanel and also that Stijn Devolder, the Belgian national champion who owes much of his notoriety to Flanders with the two victories reported in 2008 and 2009. A sort of Flemish Petrucci because, like it happened to our Loretto after two triumphs at the Sanremo, Devolder hasn't won other major international races. Among the Belgians, the young Sep Vanmarcke is also well rated, second in last year's Paris-Roubaix behind a wild Cancellara.
Pavé and breathtaking walls with the return of the legendary Koppenberg 44km from the finish line in Oudenaarde, the Tour of Flanders with its 259km is never trivial, always managing to touch the ropes of great cycling even if the winners have been missing for too long all-season racer, the one who knows how to win the road classic and the great stage race. It is a feature of today's cycling that has so many fine champions, each with its own marked specialization: it is no coincidence that the last winner of a Giro or a Tour to triumph in the Tour of Flanders was Gianni Bugno in 1994. The same goes for Sanremo and Roubaix: we have to go back to 1990 to find Bugno himself first in the city of flowers after Laurent Fignon's one-two (1988 and 1989), another great capable of winning on every track. We even have to go back to 1981 for the very classic cobbled event which since 1981, the year in which Bernard Hinault won it – after Moser's unforgettable hat-trick in the three previous editions – has not seen a big name in stage racing excel. And of the winners of Giri and Tour at the next Ronde there will be only Bradley Wiggins, an authentic phenomenon in 2012, the season in which the English baronet won everything before falling back into total anonymity in 2013. At 33 he tries a difficult revival by returning to the Ronde which saw him as a modest participant in 2005 when he finished, confused in the rear, only 85th.
