MikePadgett.com

Every year on the first weekend in April, the Ronde van Vlaanderen cycle race files through the lanes and villages of Flanders.

If this sounds like a Sunday idyll to you, think about the heavy, freezing rain permeating your clothing whilst you’re buffeted by strong crosswinds from the North Sea.

Then contemplate pulling your bike through 264 kilometres of slippery roads and up steep, cobbled climbs harangued by deafening crowds.

Sometimes it’s hard to recognise the winner as he crosses the finish line, his every feature covered by a thick layer of mud.

The great Wall

The little town of Geraardsbergen straddles the river Dender in a quiet corner of East Flanders. Today around 30,000 locals call it home, yet in 1068 it was one of the first places in Western Europe to be deemed a city. In 1381, the Hainault nobleman Walter of Enghien sacked and burned it after the residents showed defiance toward his siege.

You might be forgiven for wondering just what is all the fuss about Geraardsbergen?

Well, the answer might not be the town itself but what it stands on, in these parts a rare thing and a continued source of fame today. For unlike most other towns and villages in Flanders, this one has a hill.

The Muur (”Wall”) of Geraardsbergen is 110 metres high. A mere adolescent pimple by Alpine standards, of course, but in a land of uninterrupted plains and pancake flat polders, a major strategic advantage. In the kingdom of the blind and all that.

And whilst ancient warriors no longer do battle on it, a cohort of bike riders has replaced them, followed by a legion of cycling fans.

No pain, no gain

Geraardsbergen’s other peculiarity is the Mattentaarte, a strangely familiar sort of cake that’s baked locally. The Mattentaarte bears some resemblance to the Muur itself as it rises stoutly but suddenly from the plate like a shallow sided volcano. The view from the top of the cone covers several miles of the Flandrian countryside in all directions.

During the race, the riders will never see the view. The crowds at the summit form several bodies deep beside the road and up the steep verges on either side. Like the mountain stages of the Tour de France, here they part at the last moment in a peristaltic wave as the riders thread their way through to the top.

The Muur is almost always the penultimate climb of the route and it can often decide the race, thinning a larger group and splitting up breakway companions. Reputations are made and sealed here. Edwig van Hooydonck made the final cut in 1989 and broke away to win, establishing himself on the professional circuit. In 1995, the Flemish Johan Museeuw tore away alone on the Muur and never looked like being caught again. This was the second of his three wins in the race. Meanwhile, the ever-controversial Franck Vandenbroucke fell on the Muur in 1999 and could only manage second at the finish.