{"id":3828,"date":"2026-02-27T12:34:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T12:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/3828\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T12:34:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T12:34:10","slug":"biniam-girmay-has-kuurne-brussels-kuurne-circled-slightly-more-than-omloop-het-nieuwsblad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/3828\/","title":{"rendered":"Biniam Girmay has Kuurne\u2013Brussels\u2013Kuurne circled slightly more than Omloop Het Nieuwsblad"},"content":{"rendered":"

Biniam Girmay<\/a> has certainly not missed a beat since joining NSN, but the Eritrean is hoping to turn his early-season form into results on Flemish roads too. That starts <\/a>this weekend with Omloop Het Nieuwsblad<\/a> (Saturday) and, in particular<\/a>, Kuurne\u2013Brussels\u2013Kuurne<\/a> (Sunday). \u201cIt\u2019s always pretty hectic,\u201d Girmay said of Belgium\u2019s Opening Weekend.The 25-year-old has already won in Valencia and Almer\u00eda this year. Despite having plenty of experience in the Classics, it will only be the second time he has raced both Omloop and Kuurne. \u201cIt\u2019s quite funny, to be honest \u2013 I\u2019ve raced at a lot of the Classics, but I\u2019ve only been to Opening Weekend once,\u201d he explained in a team preview<\/a>. \u201cThe year I came, I asked my old team to race\u2026 I think that from this year on, for sure, we will come here every year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo!<\/p>\n

\"bini-girmay\"\/<\/p>\n

Biniam Girmay begins opening weekend as NSN chief.<\/p>\n

Girmay learned plenty from recon rides<\/p>\n

With limited Opening Weekend mileage, the recon was extra important. \u201cIt was good to remind ourselves of the parcours, but these races are always left, right, and small roads,\u201d Girmay said after riding the routes. \u201cBut it\u2019s super helpful to have people like Tom and Guillaume, who are experienced in these races, with me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Girmay is looking at Sunday as the key objective. \u201cWe have a big and clear goal with the team, especially for Sunday,\u201d he added. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be tough to win these races, especially on Saturday with the startlist, but we will try anyway. We have a good team around me, full of strong riders who will stay with me until the last part of the races.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo!<\/p>\n

\"biniam-girmay\"\/NSN targeting a \u201cgreat result\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel good, and also my teammates feel good,\u201d Girmay continued. \u201cBut this is the first race in Belgium, it\u2019s always pretty hectic, so we\u2019re just trying to find the best team spirit, because these races will help us towards our next big goals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sports director Dimitri Claeys (who worked with Girmay previously at Intermarch\u00e9\u2013Wanty) echoed that confidence: \u201cWe see that all of the guys are in great shape so we\u2019re targeting a great result this weekend. Of course, we have Biniam as our main leader, but we also have guys like Riley Sheehan, Lewis Askey, and Hugo Hofstetter on Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Selection NSN Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne 2026<\/p>\n

Lewis Askey
Guillaume Boivin
Biniam Girmay
Mat\u00ees Louvel
Ryan Mullen
Riley Sheehan
Tom Van Asbroeck (only Omloop)
Hugo Hofstetter (Kuurne only)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Biniam Girmay has certainly not missed a beat since joining NSN, but the Eritrean is hoping to turn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3099,18,1682,2608,3101,3100],"class_list":{"0":"post-3828","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brussels","8":"tag-biniam-girmay","9":"tag-brussels","10":"tag-cycling","11":"tag-kuurne-brussels-kuurne","12":"tag-nsn-cycling-team","13":"tag-omloop-het-nieuwsblad"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}