Sébastien Hinault: "A Travers la Flandre: the dress rehearsal”
A Travers la Flandre, a prestigious and competitive race, is in a way the “general” of the Tour of Flanders. A final test for the riders just a few hours before the Ronde.
Photo GettyImages
Pre-race
“A Travers la Flandre marks the beginning of my campaign on the Flanders. I was lucky enough to ride all the Italian one-day races this spring until Milan-San-Remo, and now I will do the same in Belgium. I had a good feeling after the first big block in Italy, so I am very motivated for the start of the Flandriennes tomorrow. A Travers la Flandre is a race that I like, I already competed in it last year, and it went pretty well for me. So I’m coming with a lot of motivation and a real desire to perform. I have been able to recover from all the transalpine races that I have done, but I have also been able to work on my training in preparation for this race tomorrow and for the block of classics that I will be racing over the next few days.
The briefing
“A Travers les Flandres is the “general” of the Tour of Flanders, and even if on paper it is a little bit less “complicated” than the E3 Grand Prix, it is still a very nice Flanders. You only have to look at the list of winners to be convinced. We have a very good team at the start in Waregem, which has the means to perform with Clément Russo, Amaury Capiot, Matîs Louvel or Connor Swift who are likely to get a very good result”.