Six things the Tour of Flanders taught us about Paris-Roubaix

Holy Week is upon us, with the anticipation of Paris-Roubaix now bigger than ever after a barnstorming edition of the men's Tour of Flanders on Sunday, with all the main protagonists coming to the fore and Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) eventually scorching his way to a famous solo victory and second title at De Ronde. 

In the women's race, we saw history as Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime) kept her cool and survived all of the cobbled climbs she grew up riding on before outsprinting a top-tier trio of Liane Lippert (Movistar), Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto) and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Visma-Lease a Bike) to become the first woman ever to win De Ronde three times.

Attention will now turn to Paris-Roubaix Femmes and Paris-Roubaix and the hellish pavés of northern France that each year serve as the arena for two of the most exciting days of racing on the cycling calendar. With the dust settled and Flanders behind us, Cyclingnews looks at the key lessons learnt from a thrilling afternoon of racing on Sunday.

From the strength of Pogačar's squad to questionable tactics in the women's race and how Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) look set to challenge the 'big two' on Sunday, here are six things the Tour of Flanders taught us about Paris-Roubaix.

Lidl-Trek Women need to find a way to step up before Saturday

This time last year, Lidl-Trek headed to Paris-Roubaix fresh off winning the Tour of Flanders and as two-time winners of the race. They were second only to SD Worx-Protime in terms of stature as a Classics team, and they came away with a runner-up spot at the Hell of the North.

This year, however, Lidl-Trek's stock has taken a hit after Flanders, where their efforts often looked rudderless, and they didn't trouble the post-race headlines. Ellen van Dijk and Lauretta Hanson performed well physically, but it wasn't always clear what the plan was, and it seems like they're missing having such a clear leader like Elisa Longo Borghini. 

Some of that is temporary: Shirin van Anrooij is not yet at her best after iliac artery syndrome, and Elisa Balsamo skipped Flanders presumably in favour of Roubaix. But the fact remains that they haven't won a Classic since Trofeo Alfredo Binda, and they're looking nowhere like the honed cobbles operation they were last year.

Their Roubaix squad is yet to be announced, but it looks like they need to find a bit more sharpness to be able to compete on Sunday. Balsamo's return should help, but they'll surely be wanting more out of the likes of new signings Emma Norsgaard and Anna Henderson, who on paper make the team stronger but haven't quite pulled off a result yet.

Paris-Roubaix won't just be a two-horse race between Pogačar and Van der Poel

The men's Tour of Flanders was billed as a two-horse race, with Tadej Pogačar and Mathieu van der Poel as the only possible winners in many people's eyes. But what the 269km of brutal racing told us is that next Sunday's Paris-Roubaix should be far from another round of the pair's rivalry, with a whole host of strong secondary favourites bubbling under and ready to compete for the victory.

Mads Pedersen continued to prove that he is in the Classics shape of his life, as the third strongest rider over the climbs on the day, and the best sprinter after such a brutal race. Once Pogačar had gone solo, Pedersen, with the help of teammate Jasper Stuyven, claimed second place in a career-best Flanders performance. His team were full of confidence at the finish, and with much less elevation gain to contend with throughout Paris-Roubaix's 260km, the Dane looks like he is capable of upsetting the two favourites. 

Wout van Aert did similarly as he and Visma-Lease a Bike got back on track with a well-organised team performance that saw the men in yellow and black take fourth through the Belgian. The team tactics were on point, and they again utilised a full squad to maximise their results against the narrowly superior riders. Again, however, Van Aert will benefit from less climbing in Roubaix, and with the confidence back after Flanders, he should be dangerous over the hellish pavés.

Outside of those two, the likes of Filippo Ganna and Stefan Küng can also take a lot of confidence into Paris-Roubaix, where they should be more on their favoured terrain and more likely to live with the stinging attacks of Pogačar and Van der Poel. Both men got into a break at Flanders and ended in the top 10. If they can do similarly at the weekend, then a top result could be just around the corner. 

Sports directors need to be ambitious and pragmatic against SD Worx-Protime

Lotte Kopecky and SD Worx-Protime are not unbeatable, but when you see how certain teams raced the final phase of the Tour of Flanders, you would think they all thought she was. Movistar led the way when it came to attacking, and Liane Lippert showed the blueprint for what all team leaders should have been doing – trying to distance the world champion.

Of course, that is a task much easier said than done, otherwise, we wouldn't have witnessed her claim her third title. However, the propensity for teams to ride conservatively and wait for the moves was certainly confusing.  

Then, once the four strongest riders had finally got away on the final lap up the Oude Kwaremont, with Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, Kasia Niewiadoma and Lippert joining the Belgian, they paced to keep the group away before the final sprint in Oudenaarde.

It's a tricky game gambling with a guaranteed top four and likely podium finish, but winning the sprint against Kopecky was so unlikely to happen, even after a race as tough as Flanders, so could they not have tried to make her do the lion's share of the work? Do they not believe they can beat Kopecky? Second, third or fourth at Flanders is no easy feat, but if teams are going to knock SD Worx-Protime off of top spot, then that confidence and willingness to make the race as Movistar tried to do will be key, especially on Saturday when they try to stop her from retaining her Paris-Roubaix crown.

Sports directors must be pragmatic at Paris-Roubaix in the battle against Kopecky

UAE Team Emirates-XRG may just be the strongest team on the start line on Sunday

It's nothing new to say that UAE Team Emirates-XRG are strong – they have the biggest salary bill in pro cycling, they destroy the Tour de France year after year, and they've already won 24 times this year – but they showed a real Classics edge on Sunday, and proved why they'll be the top team this weekend.

Firstly, as Pogačar pointed out in his post-race press conference on Sunday evening, they head to Roubaix with two former runners-up in their line-up in Nils Politt (second in 2019, fourth in 2024) and Florian Vermeersch (second in 2021), so it's pretty obvious that they know how to perform well here, even if Pogačar is a newbie. 

But perhaps more importantly, Sunday's race showed us that, possibly more than any other team, UAE are adept at navigating through chaos, and that may be the biggest key for Roubaix.

The Hell of the North is always a race that is characterised by chaos, crashes and confusion, and the way teams are or aren't able to deal with that can be the difference between winning and losing. More so than Flanders or any other race, you can expect to lose your teammates to crashes or positioning and have to adapt on the fly. 

UAE had something of a dry run of this on Sunday, with crashes taking out Narvaez and Wellens, and holding up Politt and Vermeersch at various points. But instead of panic, Mikel Bjerg took control of the race, not losing grip of the plan, whilst Vermeersch was able to come back, and they could execute a version of what they'd wanted to do from the start.

If they can do this in Flanders, it's a good sign for Roubaix, and the tactical clear-headedness combined with an obvious physical strength should make UAE a real superpower on the cobbles.

There’s finally tech parity between the men’s and women’s peloton

Having roamed the paddocks at the start of both the men’s and women’s races it’s clear that the women’s peloton is just as tech forward now. Yes, Mathieu van der Poel was using prototype wheels (until he crashed and had to swap bikes), but in general the women’s riders were using wider tyres than the men and there were just as many instances of the new Zipp wheels with integrated tyre sensors. 

The UAE Team ADQ riders seemed to be using 32c tyres, while Pogačar was sticking to his usual 30c option he uses for all road races. We’ve proved that wider tyres are faster by some margin on the cobbles, and yet the men’s field seems fundamentally opposed to using anything over a 30c for Flanders. 

While Marianne Vos was also using 30c tyres, the starkest contrast in tech adoption came in the Visma camp, with Vos and teammate Pauline Ferrand-Prévot both using a self-inflating tyre system from Gravaa. Vos used it to take gravel worlds in 2024, and despite only using it for two days before the race, Ferrand-Prévot used it to come second. 

Contrast this to the men's field, where no riders used the system, despite being seen testing it in 2024, and it being ridden to victory this year under Matthew Brennan at the GP Denain. 

Ultimately the sport is finally at a point where sponsors can no longer short change the women’s teams, especially in the lead-up to Roubaix. 

The best Classics teams are built not bought

Classics squads can take years to cultivate, with the very best overall outfits at Visma-Lease a Bike, Lidl-Trek and Alpecin-Deceuninck taking some time to reach the level they now operate at. 

Of course, having three of the best leaders helps that, but the likes of Pedersen, Stuyven and Toms Skujiņš have now been racing together in Flanders for several seasons. They know each other very well, allowing them to make quicker decisions in the final and how best to aid each other in the fight against the top superstars.

The same applies at Visma, where team strength at Flanders saw them maximised their result with fourth, after doing everything they could with Tiesj Benoot in the break and Van Aert and Matteo Jorgenson following in the wheels behind. Granted, Jorgenson is relatively new in only his second year at Visma but the Belgian pair are into their fourth year of race partnership now. 

That experience together can't be underestimated, and the likes of Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe highlighted how that kind of synergy can't just be bought. Young Classics prospect Laurence Pithie was brought in for 2025, alongside Oier Lazkano and the Van Dijke twins, Mick and Tim. After all four impressed last season, it looked as though it could be a recipe for success, however, they only managed 11th in Flanders, after disappointing at E3, Gent-Wevelgem and Dwars door Vlaanderen.

Maybe in years to come, they can build into a well-oiled machine like the teams mentioned above; however, still, it shows that Classics teams need to be built, not bought. The one team that could buck that trend on paper is UAE, with Pogačar's support squad being bolstered by Jhonatan Narváez and Florian Vermeersch, however, the core of Tim Wellens and Mikkel Bjerg was also in support of the world champion when he won Flanders, and with clarity over leadership, their job is simpler, albeit not easier.

Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe could bounce back at Paris-Roubaix, but expect the likes of Alpecin-Deceuninck, Lidl-Trek, Visma-Lease a Bike and UAE Team Emirates-XRG to dominate the front of the peloton and best position their leaders heading into the key sectors in northern France.

Other key learnings

Men's race

Ineos Grenadiers have their best chance yet to shine at Paris-Roubaix. They've been impressive and aggressive so far at the cobbled Classics, and with the terrain flattening out, their squad of powerful riders like Ganna, Tarling and Turner should be at its best.

Van der Poel is back on his favourite terrain after losing to Pogačar at Flanders. There won't be 17 climbs on the road from Compiégne to the Roubaix Velodrome, and the two-time defending champion will be looking for a hat-trick on the roads he dominated 12 months ago.

After such a brutal race in Flanders, and with Pogačar and Van der Poel possibly cancelling each other out, the sprinters could be more in play. The likes of Jonathan Milan, Tim Merlier and Jasper Philipsen, who was twice finished second at this race, should be very confident in anticipation of the pavé.

Women's race

Movistar's women's team are now a top-rate Classics team, thanks to the Lippert-Reusser-Ferguson combo and aggressive directing from Kelvin Dekker.

Vos' dream to win Roubaix might have to wait another year – after a strong Milan-San Remo bolstered hopes, a difficult day in Flanders dampened them again.

Very few women's riders are specifically targeting Roubaix, with riders looking ahead to the Ardennes and Grand Tours already, and we should expect to see different tactics as a result.

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