Tomorrow the penultimate World Tour race of the year gets underway, Eneco Tour. The 7 stage Dutch-Belgian race will include 5 road stages, an individual time trial on stage 2 and a team time trial on stage 5. The final stage will see the riders finish in Geraardsbergen after the start takes place Bolsward tomorrow.

It will be the first time Team Dimension Data for Qhubeka start the Eneco Tour and the African Team look forward to a good, hard week of racing. As a two-time victor of the Eneco Tour, Edvald Boasson Hagen will be the leader for the race as he tries to add a 3rd Eneco Tour title to his palmares.

The road stages will typically suit the Norwegian champion with all the climbs being of a short, sharp nature, it will be the small roads and wind that could see time being won or lost on these days. The two time trial stages is where a definite shake up on the GC will take place. The 9.6km individual time trial should suit Boasson Hagen perfectly while he will need to rely on his teammates for the stage 5, 21km team time trial.

Bernie Eisel, Mark Renshaw, Tyler Farrar, Nathan Haas, Youcef Reguigui, Jay Thomson and Johann van Zyl will be the 7 riders riding in service of Boasson Hagen over the coming week. As a number of riders use the Eneco Tour as preparation for the World Championships, a high quality race is expected once again.

Jay Thomson said:

"It’ll be my first time at Eneco Tour and I’m really looking forward to it. Hopefully we can carry some of our success from the Tour of Britain, Vuelta and Canadian races to Eneco. We going to the race with an experienced team, especially with Edvald having won the overall twice before. We will be looking to him to repeat that feat. With one individual time trial and a team time trial, it’s going to be all about the team being super strong to help set up Edvald for the overall."

Mark Cavendish was set to do the race but has reportedly fallen ill.