Soft pulls, subtle digs: The Tour of Flanders mind games have already begun – Analysis

A soft pull, a subtle dig in an interview, a side eye on the start line. We are in the ten days running up to the Tour of Flanders, a period defined by the battles in the E3 Saxo Classic, Gent-Wevelgem (now In Flanders Fields), and Dwars door Vlaanderen, but the real game between the favourites is much deeper than that.

These ten days are also about scoping your opponents out, learning to read their team, even getting into their heads when you can. The number of turns traded in a race or the specific words said at the finish line might seem minor, but they can add up as the tension builds towards the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix.