The history of the Eneco Tour may be short - it has only been in existence in its current UCI WorldTour format since 2005 - but it is rich nonetheless.
Formed out of the ailing Netherlands Tour and originally designed to become a stage race spanning Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, the Eneco Tour has become a key summer race on the UCI WorldTour calendar.
The Eneco Tour’s statistics in the past decade show that time and again, its terrain favours the sprinters and the all-rounders, with a record of six stages victories held jointly by Tom Boonen (Etixx-Quick Step) and André Greipel (Lotto-Soudal). However talented time trialists who are not too daunted by the shorter, sharp climbs that feature across the southern Netherlands and Belgium are equally in their element in this race and are often given a chance of overall victory. Indeed, two such riders - Edvald Boasson Hagen of Norway and Ivan Gutierrez of Spain - are the joint record holders for overall triumphs in the race’s 10 year modern history, with two victories each. Another very gifted chrono-man, multiple time trial World Champion Tony Martin, was another winner of the Eneco Tour back in 2010, whilst the German’s Etixx-Quick Step team-mate Zdenek Stybar, as at home in the hilly, technical climbs of cyclo-cross as he is on the road, triumphed in 2013.
Last year’s winner of the Eneco Tour, Tim Wellens, created his own small but significant niche in cycling history when the young Lotto-Belisol (now Lotto-Soudal) rider became the first ever Belgian to claim victory in the week-long stage race. What made the Belgian's achievement even more notable was that he had only been a last minute participant in the Eneco Tour because of illness. But after attacking 30 kilometres from the finish of stage six to Aywaille, Wellens dominated the final climbs and the opposition, to claim an impressive solo stage win. Just 24 hours later, he went on to take the overall win.
Now well established after ten years of existence, the seven-stage Eneco Tour has settled into a recognisable format: four flat stages to give the sprinters a chance to battle for the leader’s white jersey, followed by a much hillier finale from stage five onwards. A medium-length individual time trial - like last year’s 16 kilometre race against the clock at Breda, won by 2014 World Time Trial bronze medallist Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) - is almost invariably included too. Its purpose is either to establish an initial hierarchy of GC contenders in the opening stages, or as a way of bringing down the curtain on the Eneco Tour, and finally deciding who will win one of the most technically challenging races of the UCI WorldTour.