Baloise Belgium Tour 2025 Stage 1

June 18, 2025 It's a traditional stage from Merelbeke-Melle to the beach town of Knokke-Heist with a likely sprint finish on the coast. There is almost nothing of note on the profile, with only 600M of elevation over the 198KM route. With 70KM to go, the riders enter the finishing circuit that is taken on three times. Halfway through the second lap is the Golden Kilometer with bonus seconds available in three sprints across the kilometer. The finale should be a fight for the last corner at 500M and full bunch finish. The race got underway after a moment of silence for Ludo Dierckxsens, former professional rider and member of the Baloise Tour staff, after he passed away during a charity ride at the end of May. Six riders made the break including Dylan Vandenstorme of Flanders-Baloise, Quentin Bezza of Wagner-Bazin, Yorben Lauryssen of Pauwels Sauzen-Cibel Clementines, Frits Biesterbos of BEAT Cycling, Victor Broex of Metec-SOLARWATT p/b Mantel, and Gianni Marchand of Tarteletto-Isorex. Their lead was 2 minutes 15 seconds with 83KM to go with Alpecin-Deceuninck, Uno-X Mobility, and Soudal Quickstep doing the controlling in the bunch. The break made it to the circuit with a reduced gap of 1 minute 15 seconds. With 67KM to go, the break made a left turn on to the finish straight with the North Sea and rows upon rows of umbrellas and beach huts for the incoming Summer Holiday-makers on their right side. A bit of disharmony crept into the break with 52KM to go as their lead was slowly being eroded away. The group nearly came to a track stand a few kilometers later with the Super8 sprint checkpoint just ahead. Vandenstorme wound it up and took the sprint. Biesterbos that counter attacked but he was brought back and cooperation resumed. Lidl-Trek came to the front to position themselves for the Golden Kilometer coming with 24.5KM to go. Bezza and Marchand attacked through the finish line at 2 laps to go but the bunch were a mere 10 seconds behind and the pair were swept up 2KM later. Lotto, Picnic-PostNL, Lidl-Trek, and Uno-X Mobility all lined up to position themselves for the three sprints in the Golden Kilometer. Jonas Abrahamsen of Uno-X Mobility won the first sprint after a great lead out with his teammate Ådne Holter in second and Ben Turner of Ineos in third. Søren Kragh Andersen of Lidl-Trek won the second sprint ahead of Turner and Jasper Philipsen of Alpecin-Deceuninck with Jenno Berckmoes of Lotto winning the third sprint in front of Filippo Ganna of Ineos and Florian Vermeersch of UAE-XRG. Olivier Godfroid of Baloise-Glowi Lions and Stijn Appel of BEAT Cycling counter attacked the peloton after the sprints but they never got more than 10 seconds and were reeled in just outside of 10KM to go. Speed picked up with 10KM to go and the peloton were packed tight across the road. Shortly after, a crash took down Zeno Moonen of Intermarché-Wanty and Jonas Abrahamsen. Moonen was able to get up and ride off but Abrahamsen suffered a broken collarbone which will likely jeopardize his Tour de France selection. With 3KM to go, the race entered the urban streets of Knokke-Heist and the roads got much tighter. Soudal Quickstep, Movistar, and Israel-Premier Tech were best placed, each were well organized with good numbers. The last kilometer was hectic as might be expected. Lead outs got washed away and through the final corner at 500M, the only team to have numbers together was Picnic-PostNL. They ran out of fire power however with 300M to go though and the front of the bunch fanned out across the road. Tim Merlier of Soudal Quickstep, who was poorly positioned through the final corner, took advantage of this slow down and came up the outside, starting his sprint with 250M to go. Philipsen tried to follow Merlier but got his front wheel caught to the side of the rear wheel of TotalEnergies' Jason Tesson and nearly crashed. Merlier got such a jump on the rest that with 100M to go, he had four bike lengths on Ethan Vernon of Israel-Premier Tech who was the next closest rider. He powered up the small incline overlooking the Knokke Strand to take the win and first leader's jersey. Juan Sebastián Molano of UAE-XRG pipped Vernon for second place.