The 104th Tour de Flanders will not take place on Sunday as scheduled, but organizers will host a "virtual" online edition featuring 13 of the world's best classic riders.

2019 Flanders champion Alberto Bettiol (EF Pro Cycling) will be joined by Greg Van Avermaert (CCC Team), Oliver Naessen (AG2R La Mondiale), Jasper Steiven (Trek Segafredo) Mike Tunissen and Wout Van Aert (both Jumbo Visma) will be at the virtual start line, called the "Delonde 2020 confinement edition".

Deceuninck-QuickStep has two cobbled classics specialists in Zdenek Stybar and Yves Lampaert, plus Remco Evenepoel, a 20-year-old sensation who had targeted this year's Giro d'Italia.

Tim Wellens and Thomas de Gendt of Lotto Soudal and Michael Matthews (fourth in his debut Tour de Flanders last year) and Nicolas Roche of Team Sunweb will be on the start list.

The actual Tour de Flanders was 266 km long and the riders were scheduled to be in the saddle for over 6 hours, but the online version is only 32 km long.

Using Bkool's online cycling platform, this 32 km is the finale of the Flanders course and riders will cross the Kruisberg, Oude Kwaremont, and Paterberg, with a 13 km run-in to the finish in Oudenaarde.

The athletes will compete from their homes using smart trainers that can replicate the demands of the climbs and cobblestones, which will be streamed through Kiswe and broadcast on the Belgian TV channel Sporza.

Riders enter their body weight and their speed is determined by their power-to-weight ratio.

The difficulty of the Kwaremont lies in its 2.2 km length and rough cobblestones, but the Paterberg, which starts just 3 km later, is a short but devilishly steep climb. The riders then descend down narrow farm roads and finish in Oudenaarde on a flat last 10 km.