He doesn't always win, indeed so far he has reaped much less than he sowed, but when he races he is always the big favourite: Peter Sagan has the mentality that Merckx had, if he competes, he wants to win. And this Sunday the Slovak world champion will try to do an encore in the Tour of Flanders, the classic monument of infinite paved walls that saw him triumph in solitary last year, wheeling his bike across the finish line like a true acrobat of the pedal. In one-day races he is the strongest man around, capable of relaunching even on dry snatches of the Northern walls without paying in power in any sprints, but what betrays him in this start of the season is the exuberant desire to give every time show as well as a team, Bora Hansgrohe which does not seem the best equipped to support him. Thus, despite always being the protagonist, Sagan has so far only won the Kurse-Brussel-Kurse, too little for his ambitions. At Sanremo he did amazing things but at the finish line he was mocked by Mikal Kwiatkowski, at Harelbecke3 a crash took him out of the way, at Ghent-Wevelgen only against everyone he had to settle for third place.
Besides Kwiatkowski, it was Greg Van Avermaet, the Rio Olympic gold medalist who took advantage of Sagan's lack of victories, who this year, on the threshold of turning 32, seems to have reached the top of his form, as evidenced by the flurry of successes achieved, at starting from Het Nieuwsblad up to the double in a few at E3 Harelbecke and Ghent-Wevelgem. Thus by right Van Avermaet, on the eve of the Ronde, shares with Sagan the role of great favorite of the very classic wall climb which he has never won, even though he came close to success in 2014 second behind Fabian Cancellara and in 2015 third preceded by Alexander Kristoff and Niki Terpstra . A 260 km course, from Antwerp to Oudernaarde, with 18 walls to tackle, the Ronde is a very tough race, with the risk of falls always lurking: Sagan and Greg Van Avermaet are the men to beat but it won't be easy for them to win a competition either who appears fierce: there is Philippe Gilbert, third twice in 2009 and 2010, fresh winner in the Three Days of De Panne, who appears to have returned to his 2011 splendour, when he scored a hat-trick in the Ardennes before becoming world champion in 2012; there are bad clients for everyone like Kristoff, John Degenkolb and Geraint Thomas; there is also a great of the classics like Tom Boonen who is about to face his last Ronde and his last Roubaix in search of the solitary record of four victories in Flanders and a historic five in Roubaix. On 9 April, once the classic paved monument is over, cycling, after Cancellara's farewell, will have to say goodbye to the exit from the circus of one of its most extraordinary interpreters capable of winning a world championship (2005), five E3 Harelbeke, three Ghent-Wevelgem, three Flanders, four Roubaix.
