This year the organizers of Flanders Classics officially recorded the climb times of the Old Kwaremont at the Tour of Flanders. And while there is little doubt or surprise about who were the fastest – Tadej Pogačar and Mathieu Van der Poel – the most interesting data comes from the women's race.

Demi Vollering climbed the famous cobbled wall in 3'30", an impressive figure when compared to the men's race. If we look at the second passage on the Old Kwaremont (the women only went through it once), the very strong Dutch athlete was beaten by only 16 men. And among those she beat is also Remco Evenepoel, who crested in 3'32".

Obviously the context of the two races is different: Vollering faced the Kwaremont after 147 km of racing, Evenepoel after 260 km with the race already blown apart. If we analyze the times of the first passage they are naturally lower, also because Pogačar attacked right there, even before the cobbled section, going all out and finishing the climb in 2'48", with the same time as Remco.

The satisfaction of the fastest climb of the day, however, goes to Van der Poel, who having approached the first Kwaremont a bit further back, had to push to catch up with the Slovenian, stopping the clock at 2'46". On the second passage Pogačar closed in 3'02", and Van der Poel in 3'09", so adding up the two climbs the record still belongs to the world champion with a margin of 5" over the Dutchman.

To view all official times CLICK HERE