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There's a theme to this end of the season race organising, and 'normal' is the watchword. Hoogstraten is, again, disappointingly sane. Grassland and hills, hills and grassland. On the upside: some of the hills are really pretty damn steep, and February in Belgium means there's about a 48%* chance of snow and ice. And in case you didn't know: snow and ice races are AWESOME.
*number may not be supported by any factual evidence
Downside: no snow and ice.
Upside: plenty of rain these past days, and killer winds today. Almost storm. Plus, apparently they've made some changes to the race and it is now HARD. Plus, a very long sandpit. And mud.
First guy in the Superprestige wins 15 points, second 14, third 13 etc. Niels has a nice gap now, but he's also got no shape and no confidence; quite the opposite is true for Svenness. Nys has 12 - yes, twelve - Superprestige overalls already, and he'd quite like number 13. Hoogstraten is the penultimate SP race.
| 1. | Niels Albert | 79 punten |
| 2. | Sven Nys | 73 |
| 3. | Lars van der Haar (Ned) | 63 |
| 4. | Philipp Walsleben (Dui) | 61 |
| 5. | Klaas Vantornout | 58 |
| 6. | Tom Meeusen | 58 |
| 7. | Rob Peeters | 43 |
| 8. | Kevin Pauwels | 38 |
| 9. | Bart Aernouts | 33 |
| 10. | Thijs van Amerongen (Ned) | 27 |