Well, the 2021 cobbled classics season was fun while it lasted.
Wednesday’s Scheldeprijs officially marked the end of the northern classics. And what a ride it was. It’s a shame we lost Paris-Roubaix for the second spring in a row, but as pandemic conditions stubbornly hang on across Europe, it’s nothing short of a spring miracle that the Flemish classics went off without major disruption.
“Racing behind closed doors” beats racing virtually any day for me.
Sunday’s tremendous editions of both the men’s and women’s races at Ronde van Vlaanderen, even if muted without millions of cheering fans, only underscores the power and intrigue of one-day racing. Only the high stakes of the Tour de France can match the classics.