The Tour of Flanders is the second Monument of the year and acts as the prelude to the final cobbled Classic of the season, Paris-Roubaix. The biggest tech stories are typically reserved for next weekend, and yet, marching around the team buses in a windswept Antwerp, there were enough quirks and quiet experiments to make it worth slowing down and taking a closer look.
From Visma-Lease a Bike’s attempts to improve tyre retention to Remco Evenepoel’s eye-catching sidewalls, Flanders offered an early look at the calculated balance between performance, durability, and risk management shaping this year’s Classics.
No custom 'TP' logo on Pogačar's chainrings at Flanders this year (left). Instead, his Y1Rs and spare bikes all had standard Carbon-Ti chainrings, and although the sizes were blacked out, he was using a 55/40 combination. On the right: The custom chainrings he used at Milan-San Remo last year.
Did we do a good job with this story?
