Team LottoNL-Jumbo was unable to play a role in Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne today in Belgium. Lars Boom and Maarten Wynants abandoned early and Dylan Groenewegen saw the first group ride clear on the Kwaremont. Instead, Peter Sagan won in Kuurne, Groenewegen was the fastest of the peloton in 18th.

"We were hoping for a sprint, so we rode strongly in the chase,” Groenewegen said. “Unfortunately, it was not possible to get back in front.

“We knew that I wouldn’t be good enough to follow guys like Sagan and Van Avermaet. You know they are there to attack, but you hope for a good organisation behind to catch the eventual attack group."

"Immediately, I said we had to keep up the pace and we did. It took a while before other teams helped us. We came within 30 seconds and soon I was hoping to sprint. The Sagan group attacked more and gap grew again. We just missed a few men to really close the gap."

He mostly missed Boom and Wynants. Boom had too many problems after his crash during the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad yesterday. Wynants crashed today and, like Boom, he dropped out.

‘Not satisfied’

"I saw two good races, but we were not good enough,” Race Director Nico Verhoeven said. “Because of the circumstances, we lost some riders. But all in all, we were just not good enough.

"We had two riders who definitely could ride with the best on the Kwaremont, Wynants and Boom. Tankink should’ve also been able to do it, but he told us that he was not in a good shape today. If you also lose Wynants and Boom, it’s going to be hard.”

The young Norwegian Amund Grøndahl Jansen crashed also. He rebounded and chased. Verhoeven said that the abandoned men were no excuse for a bad showing.

"If there are 20 men riding away, just one of our riders has to be there,” Verhoeven said. “We were not good enough and we were not in the right place."