BMC's Greg Van Avermaet won the E3 Harelbeke Classic in Belgium.
A 206.1 race from Harelbeke and back again was over fifteen climbs and five sets of cobbles and saw Tony Gallopin forced to abandon early on after a crash.
Alexis Gougeard (AG2R La Mondiale), Laurens De Vreese (Astana), David Per (Bahrain-Merida), Gijs van Hoecke (LottoNl-Jumbo), Taco van der Hoorn (Roompot), and Christophe Masson (WB Veranclassic) got away in the second hour of racing and had a lead of five minutes before Tom Boonen put In an attack which dropped the lead down to 1.26.
Philippe Gilbert, Greg Van Avermaet, Oliver Naesen and Lukas Postlberger along with Cannondale Drapac's Sep Vanmarcke then bridged across with Luke Durbridge (Orica-Scott) and they took over the lead of the race with 59kms left.
De Vreese was the only rider who could keep pace with this new group and made it seven in the break. However, Naesen of AG2R put in an attack which split the break with only Greg Van Avermaet and Gilbert able to respond.
The trio built a lead of two minutes and into the final kilometre, Gilbert led them out but Greg Van Avermaet of BMC made his move and took the win in 4.48.17 ahead of Gilbert and Naesen.
Van Avermaet said about his win: "I was happy how I felt. I didn't feel so good on Wednesday but I'm happy things are not so bad," Van Avermaet said after fighting a cold earlier in the week.
"It's just nice to win a Classic in Flanders and I think E3 is one of the nicest ones. It gives a lot of confidence for Flanders. I'm just happy to have two nice victories in my pocket and hopefully the third will come next week."
Article by Kev Monks for Digital Sports Group.
Source: DSG
