Startlist Nokere Koerse 2026 | Riders: Jasper Philipsen, Jordi Meeus, Juan Sebastian Molan and Pascal Ackermann headline strong sprinter field

The Nokere Koerse is one of Belgium's most popular semi-classics and a firm holder of a key position in the spring calendar. Taking place on the 18th of March this year, it provides the classics specialists and sprinters with a golden opportunity to perform in spring classics territory. We take a look at its startlist.

The race had its first edition back in 1944, during World War 2, which surprisingly did not put to a stop the race in its first two editions. The legend Marcel Kint was the first winner, and plenty big local names have won over the decades. Reddy Maertens, Johan Capiot and Jo Planckaert are amongst them; whilst in recent decades it's been a mix of classics specialists and sprinters taking the wins.

More notably we've seen the likes of Nacer Bouhanni, Fabio Jakobsen and Tim Merlier win on these roads, making it an attractive option for the sprinters during the spring. Last year Nils Eekhoff won the small peloton sprint ahead of Matteo Moschetti.

Download the startlist in A4. The race features 13 World Tour teams, almost a full World Tour race with XDS Astana Team, Team Jayco AlUla (Pascal Ackermann), Bahrain - Victorious, Uno-X Mobility, NSN Cycling Team, Lidl-Trek, Alpecin - Premier Tech (Jasper Philipsen), Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe (Jordi Meeus), Team Picnic PostNL (Fabio Jakobsen), Lotto - Intermarché, Soudal - Quick-Step (Alberto Dainese), UAE Team Emirates - XRG (Juan Sebastian Molano) and Groupama - FDJ United all present.