The ( held in
Flanders ,
Belgium . It is held every spring, exactly one week before
Paris-Roubaix , and it used to be part of the
UCI World Cup . It is now part of the
UCI ProTour and is regarded as one of the '
Monuments ' of the European professional cycling calendar.
Steffen Wesemann climbing the Muur ''(wall)'' of
Geraardsbergen in the 2004 edition of the
Ronde Van Vlaanderen . ]]
The race was initiated in
1913 by
Karel Van Wijnendaele , a former cyclist. Initially not a big success, the race was interrupted by
World War I , but continued in
1919 . In the
1920s and
1930s , the race became more popular, and is currently considered to be the most important race in Flanders, where road cycling is very popular. The nickname of the race is ''Vlaanderens mooiste'', or "Flanders's most beautiful".
The course of the race contains many steep hills, often paved with cobblestones. While it is often compared to the race in that both contain many cobbled sections, de Ronde's inclusion of many steep, and often cobbled, short hills make racing very different compared to the flat Paris-Roubaix.
The exact route of the race does not change much from year-to-year. The last major change was the inclusion of the steep Koppenberg climb in 2003, having been refurbished from its previous state of disrepair. Spectators make a sport called ''couperen'' out of trying to watch de Ronde pass by in as many points as possible
{Link without Title} .
Cyclist Roger De Vlaeminck riding the Koppenberg in the Tour of Flanders race. De Vlaeminck won Paris-Roubaix 4 times. ]]
- "''Only those who are in top condition can say that the Ronde is not hard. For everyone else, it's the Way of the Cross.''" -Andrea Tafi
Riders who win both races (Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix) in the same year are guaranteed eternal fame:
#
1923 Heiri Suter
#
1932 Romain Gijssels
#
1934 Gaston Rebry
#
1954 Raymond Impanis
#
1957 Fred De Bruyne
#
1962 Rik Van Looy
#
1977 Roger De Vlaeminck
#
2003 Peter Van Petegem
#
2005 Tom Boonen
The most famous climb is arguably the
Koppenberg climb, where the steep grade, narrow pass and (previously) poor cobblestone conditions have forced many racers to climb it on foot instead of on their bikes. An incident in 1987 where
Jesper Skibby —who was leading the race at this point and was followed by the race official's car—fell over due to loss of momentum and was almost crushed by official's car, put a stop to the inclusion of this climb until 2003 when it was extensively repaired. It should be noted that while Skibby's foot was not crushed by the car, his bicycle was.
The day before the actual race sees the cyclosportif (open) race version of de Ronde where amateur cyclists regularly participate in large numbers.
