Time flies and it's already about time for the first Belgian paved classic of the UCI WorldTour, which will take this Friday, the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke.

As a real introduction to the classics season after "A travers la Flandre" which was won by Jens Debusschere (Lotto-Soudal) who managed to beat Bryan Coquard (Direct Energie) on the line last Wednesday in a particular context after the terrorist attacks in Brussels, the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke will have a modified race route which contains a concentration of no less than 15 "mounts" mainly in the middle of the race (compared to 17 last year). Hereunder you can discover this race route in detail on Google Maps, the profile of the race and the possibility to download the race route in Google Earth with a KML file and the participants list.

The E3 Harelbeke 2016 race route on Google Maps

The start of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke will be given at the same location as where we'll known the winner of the race at the end of the afternoon, in the Stasegemsesteenweg in Harelbeke, and the riders will go off north to get to the kilometer 0 at the location where the road passes under a train bridge, close to the N43.

In order to make the map easier to read, it has been split up in 2 parts: the start of the race is blue and the second part with most of the "mounts" is orange.

From the kilometer 0, the race goes off south-east down to Kerkhove where it turns north-east towards Oudenaarde. Turning south, the riders will get to the first mount of the race, the Katteberg (600 m long with an average slope of 6.7%). Turning around Zottegem via the feeding zone on the N42 and a little visit towards Ninove allows them, via Geraardsbergen and the second feeding zone to get on the second mount of the race, La Houppe (3,440 m long with an average slope of 3.32%).

After a small detour, they'll go on towards Ronse where they'll go find the climb of the Oude Kruisberg (800 m at 4.8%) and a bit further they'll go on with the Knokteberg (1,530 m at 5.3%) and the Hotondberg (1,200 m at 4%).

That's where the orange part of the race starts where several mounts will follow each other rather quickly:
- the Kortekeer (1,000 m with an average slope of 6.4%)
- the Taaienberg de 650 m with an average slope of 9.5%)
- the Boigneberg de 2,180 m with an average slope of 5.8%)
- the Eikenberg de 1,200 m with an average slope of 5.5%)
- the Stationsberg de 460 m with an average slope of 3.2%)

And a bit further:
- the Kapelberg (900 m with an average slope of 4%)
- the Paterberg (700 m with an average slope of 12%)
- the Vieux Quaremont (Oude Kwaremont) (2,200 m with an average slope of 4.2%)
- the Karnemelkbeekstraat (1,530 m with an average slope of 4.9%)

The riders will continue north-west towards the finish and on their road they'll only find the Tiegemberg from there (1,000 m with an average slope of 6.5%) before they go of to the finish line which will be crossed first by the rider who follows up on Geraint Thomas as the winner of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke!

Hereunder you'll find the race route on Google Maps and the profile of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016. Click on the different images to open them.

The Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016 race route in Google Earth

If you prefer to see the race route of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016 in Google Earth in order, for example, to do a virtual fly-over of this race route, you can download it in Google Earth by clicking the following link:

>> Download the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016 race route Google Earth (KML file)

The participants list of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016

Geraint Thomas (Team Sky), last year's winner is not one of the 198 riders who'll start in the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016 tomorrow. Strangely, Peter Sagan (Tinkoff), winner in 2014, will wear bib number 1. If you'd like to see the full participants list with their bib numbers, click on the link below:

>> participants list of the Grand Prix E3 Harelbeke 2016

door Thomas Vergouwen
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this publication is published in: Classics | OpenStreetMap/Google Maps/Google Earth

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