Having recently won two stages in the Tour of Brtain, Marcel Kittel will line up at the Omloop van Het Houtland Lichtervelde as the two time defending champion. The German will be supported by 9 teammates that will try to set up a sprint finish in the flat race.

Marcel Kittel heads to Omloop van het Houtland looking for his third straight victory in a row at this one-day Belgium race.
Kittel won the past two editions in a bunch sprint and the team lining up here will be looking for the same outcome again this year.

The team comes here with several riders who formed a part of the successful sprint formation at this summer's Tour de France, including Roy Curvers, Albert Timmer and Tom Veelers.

Also racing are Bert De Backer and Tom Stamsnijder who played key roles in Kittel's two sprint victories at the Tour of Britain.

The team is then completed by Cheng Ji, Dries Devenyns, making his return to racing after some time out through injury and then a tooth infection, Daan Olivier, who showed strongly in Canada recently, and also Ramon Sinkeldam who returns to racing after completing the Vuelta a España.

"We come to Houtland focused on riding for a sprint for Marcel," confirmed coach Marc Reef. "There are always chances that wind will influence the race and we will watch for this. We come with a strong team though to race for this outcome and Marcel has shown on the past two occasions here that he knows how to win this race."

Line-up:

Bert De Backer (BEL)
Roy Curvers (NED)
Dries Devenyns (BEL)
Cheng Ji (CHN)
Marcel Kittel (GER)
Daan Olivier (NED)
Ramon Sinkeldam (NED)
Tom Stamsnijder (NED)
Albert Timmer (NED)
Tom Veelers (NED)