Paris-Roubaix will bear the name of 2015 winner John Degenkolb (Lotto Soudal) on the cobbled sector. John Degenkolb (Lotto Soudal), who saved the junior Paris-Roubaix last year, will bear his name on the cobblestone sector from Hornan-a-Vandigny to Hamages.

This section is the longest of the race at 3.7 km. The 13th four-star sector appeared last year, 76 km from the end of the 2019 Paris-Roubaix, which was won by Degenkolb's new teammate Philippe Gilbert.

Last February, Degenkolb set up a Gofundme page to help save the race after hearing that the race, organized by the Vélo Club de Roubaix Lille Metropole, was in danger of running out of €10,000 in funding.

In a message on the page, Degenkolb said the news "hit me like a bomb." The crowdfunding raised 17,661 euros, all of which was donated to the race organizers.

"Thank you so much for supporting Paris-Roubaix Junior," Degenkolb said after the fundraiser ended. [As soon as I receive the donations from the Gofundme platform to my account, I will send them directly to Paris-Roubaix Junior volunteers John Marais and Amis de Paris-Roubaix. I am overwhelmed by your support and words cannot express how grateful I am. Thank you."

Paris-Roubaix Junior, which will celebrate its 18th edition in 2020, was won last year by Hidde van Wijnendaal of the Netherlands. Previous winners include Geraint Thomas (2004), Jasper Steuben (2010), Mads Pedersen (2013), and Tom Pidcock (2017).

Degenkolb himself did not run the race as a junior, but won it in 2015, a year after finishing second behind Niki Terpstra and ahead of Zdenek Stival. Roubaix was also the setting for one of his most famous victories, the 2018 Tour de France.

Degenkolb, then with Trek-Segafredo, won an emotional stage 9. This was his first WorldTour victory since he and several of his Giant-Alpecin teammates were hit by a car during training camp in early 2016. Degenkolb broke his forearm and nearly lost a finger, thus missing four months of the 2016 season.

This year, Degenkolb joined Lotto Soudal after spending three seasons with Trek-Segafredo. He will team up with Philippe Gilbert to lead the Belgian team in the fascinating cobbled classics. Degenkolb will kick off his 2020 campaign on January 30 with the "Challenge Mallorca," a series of four one-day races on the island of Majorca.

He is not the first rider to name a sector of Paris-Roubaix after himself. There are two other sectors: the Haveluy to Wallace section after 1981 winner Bernard Hinault, the final cobblestone section of Roubaix after local winner Charles Couplant, who won in 1912 and 1914, and Gilbert Duclos-LaSalle, who won in 1992 and 1993.