After his unexpectedly good eighth place in today’s Eneco Tour prologue, Philippe Gilbert (Omega Pharma-Lotto) is confident over his chances for the rest of the race. The Belgian champion finished just fifteen seconds behind winner Taylor Phinney (BMC Racing), who is a two-time World pursuit champion, a former US time trial champion, and the reigning under-23 World time trial champion.
“It’s not my speciality and it wasn’t my course, so I could hardly hope for better,” said Gilbert after the race, according to Het Laatste Nieuws. “I had my race properly organised.”
With many of the specialists against the clock struggling on the many sharp corners of the 5.7km circuit. The conditions were more suited to pursuit specialists and punchy sprinters, who could cope with the continuous braking and acceleration.
"For the first kilometres we had to ride into a headwind,” Gilbert explained. “Although I gave it my full power, I only did an average of 45 kilometres per hour. Only in the final kilometre did I really have the wind at my back.
“In the first half I also had to often slow down at the roundabouts. But I'm satisfied with my eighth place and with my deficit to the winner. This result opens up a lot of opportunities."
With his prologue victory Phinney takes the first leader’s jersey of the race. With his professed liking for racing in Belgium and the Netherlands, the 21-year-old American is hoping to hold on to the lead for as long as possible. Gilbert himself has the long-term goal of taking the lead in the International Cycling Union (UCI) WorldTour classification; intending to take the season-long competition at the end of the year.
"We will see what Taylor Phinney is made of on the hills of the Ardennes and in Dutch Limburg,” said Gilbert. “But the final victory is not an obsession for me. Above all I’m interested in the points for the WorldTour ranking.”
The nature of the Eneco Tour course leads Gilbert to name another rider as the race favourite though, one who enjoyed an even better Tour de France than Gilbert did – with two stage wins – and who finished today’s prologue in second place, just seven seconds behind Phinney.
“Because there is also a time trial of almost 15 km later on, I’d put most of the expectation for the final win on Edvald Boasson Hagen [Team Sky],” said Gilbert. “But I'm ready to measure myself against the Norwegian."