The day began in Deinze with overcast weather and light winds. This gave way to a quick start and it was not until after the first intermediate sprint that the initial break of Florent Brard, Christophe Mengin, and Roger Hammond. The leaders were allowed a substantial lead (eleven minutes) for a semi-classic, which forced the peloton ride aggressively over the final 100 km.
Eventually Marcus Burghardt, Francisco Ventoso, and Óscar Freire joined the leaders with roughly 25 km to go. The six managed to hold off the remaining peloton and, with less than 1 km to go, Burghardt caught Freire by surprise and made the winning move. Burghardt's teammate, Hammond, managed to catch hold of Freire's wheel and overtook the Spaniard in the sprint for a T-Mobile Team one-two finish.
