Classic Bruges-De Panne 2025: Route, TV broadcast, live stream, favourites
Classic Bruges-De Panne 2025: the most important facts in brief
- Date26 March 2025 (men), 27 March 2025 (women)
- Distance195.6 kilometres (men), 152.7 kilometres (women)
- StartBruges, GoalDe Panne
- UCI category: (Women's) World Tour
- Premiere: 1977 (men), 2018 (women)
- Last year's winnerJasper Philipsen, Elisa Balsamo
- To the race report of the men's race
One person is happy, the other less so. That's how it is sometimes, even at Bruges-De Panne in terms of gender. For a long time, there was no women's race there. This only changed in 2018 - under rather unusual circumstances. Until then, strictly speaking, there was no Bruges-De Panne for men, but the Three Days of De Panne. For years, this mini-tour had a fixed and prominent place in the week before the Tour of Flanders.
But only until 2017; the following year, the Cross Flanders was moved to the Wednesday before the Monument. As there was no more room for a multi-day event in the packed Belgian spring programme, the organising Royal Cycling Club Panne decided on a one-day race - for both men and women.
Classic Bruges-De Panne 2025 - the route
Before 2019, the Classic Bruges-De Panne still featured cobblestones and hills, including the crossing of the Kemmelberg. Since 2020, however, only the wind, the weather and the narrow and winding, often poor concrete roads have posed the remaining challenges during the race.
A bunch sprint is by no means guaranteed at Bruges-De Panne. There is always a strong wind on the Belgian North Sea coast. The circuit in the finale around De Panne inevitably results in crosswinds, which means that wind staggering is almost unavoidable.
Starting from the Markt in Bruges, the route first heads south-west via Zedelgem, Aartrijke and Koekelare before turning west to Nieuwport. From there it is only a short distance to Veurne, where the route crosses the final circuit for the first time. The 42.9-kilometre finishing circuit begins in Adinkerke, which is completed three times by the men and twice by the women. This results in a total distance of 195.6 kilometres for the men and 152.7 kilometres for the women.
Classic Bruges-De Panne 2025: TV broadcast and live stream
In Germany, neither the men's nor the women's race will be shown live on television. However, there is a paid programme for both races Live stream on Discovery Plus. The men's race runs from 15:15-17:50 on Wednesday, that of the women of 15:15-17:40 on Thursday.
Favourites and favourites
In the men's race, the who's who of sprinters have announced their presence - above all Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin - Deceuninck), who has won the last two years. He will be joined by top sprinters such as Jonathan Milan (Lidl - Trek), Tim Merlier (Soudal Quick-Step), Olav Kooij (Team Visma | Lease a Bike), Arnaud De Lie (Lotto), Søren Wærenskjold (Uno-X Mobility), Dylan Groenewegen (Team Jayco AlUla), Phil Bauhaus (Bahrain - Victorious), Milan Fretin (Cofidis), Fabio Jakobsen (Team Picnic PostNL), Sam Welsford (Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe) or Max Kanter (XDS Astana Team).
Last year's women's winner will also be in the spotlight: Elisa Balsamo (Lidl - Trek) will attempt to defend her title. In a possible sprint, the Italian will probably have to contend with the newly crowned Milan San Remo winner Lorena Wiebes (Team SD Worx - Protime) and Charlotte Kool (Team Picnic PostNL).
