Following the early season stage races and Milano-Sanremo, the UCI WorldTour heads to northern Europe for the spring classics – the month-long series of legendary one-day races on the cobbles and climbs of France, Belgium and the Netherlands.

The racing begins with the E3 Prijs Vlaanderen Harelbeke on Friday March 23 and Gent-Wevelgem on Sunday March 25.

The E3 Prijs Vlaanderen Harelbeke is part of the UCI WorldTour for the first time this year but has always been a true classic of the cycling calendar. The race covers many of the legendary cobbled climbs or bergs that makes racing in the Flemish region of Belgium so special. The race begins and ends in Harelbeke and includes 13 climbs. These include the Eikenberg, Kapelberg (pictured), Paterberg and especially the Kwaremont – the 11th of the 13 bergs. The final climb –the Tiegemberg, is just 13km from the finish.

Fabian Cancellara dominated the race in 2011. He will face Belgium’s Tom Boonen – who is joint record holder with four wins, and riders from all of the 18 UCI WorldTour teams. Other favourites include the world’s number one ranked rider Philippe Gilbert of the BMC Racing Team and his teammates Alessandro Ballan and George Hincapie, Oscar Freire of Team Katusha, Edvald Boasson Hagen of Sky Procycling, Heinrich Haussler and Johan Van Summeren of Garmin-Barracuda and Peter Sagan of Liquigas-Cannondale.

Gent-Wevelgem is known as the sprinter’s spring classic because it has often ended with a hectic sprint finish. However the climbs of the Kemmelberg always leave the race on a knife-edge as riders try to escape the domination of the sprinters and their teams.

Tom Boonen won in 2011 but the year before, Bernhard Eisel of Austria was part of a breakaway that held off the sprinters. Boasson Hagen won in 2009, while Freire won in 2009 – all world class winners of one of the great one-day races of the spring.

Both the E3 Prijs Vlaanderen Harelbeke and Gent-Wevelgem offer 80 UCI WorldTour points to the winner, with 60 and 50 points to the second and placed riders. With points also counting for the teams and nations classification, the racing is bound to be intense.

Australia’s Simon Gerrans of the GreenEdge Cycling Team currently leads the individual WorldTour ranking after his victories at the Tour Down Under and the more recent Milano-Sanremo. Radioshack Nissan lead the team ranking, while Italy leads the nations ranking. But will they still hold the lead after E3 Prijs Vlaanderen Harelbeke and Gent-Wevelgem?