Yellow jersey favorites green

BRUSSELS — No matter who wins, this year’s Tour de France will see a changing of the guard.

And if the names of Wout Van Aert, Kasper Asgreen, Enric Mas or Caleb Ewan don’t ring a bell now, they might soon be on everybody’s lips.

In the absence of many stalwart riders who have stamped their mark on cycling’s marquee event in recent years, new faces will emerge this summer.

There is a long list of top riders missing the Tour, which starts today from Brussels with a 120.8-mile stage through Flanders and back to the Belgian capital, and that number includes:

Four-time champion Chris Froome, who is missing out for the first time since 2011.

2018 runner-up Tom Dumoulin.

Primoz Roglic, a fourthplace finisher last year.

Former world champion Philippe Gilbert.

Ace sprinters Mark Cavendish, Marcel Kittel and Fernando Gaviria.

The generational change is likely to be the most visible in the fight for the race leader’s yellow jersey, as 22year-old Egan Bernal seems ready to take over from his leader at team Ineos, defending champion Geraint Thomas.

In the wake of an already successful season during which he won the Paris-Nice and Tour de Suisse weeklong races, Bernal has been elevated to a co-leader status after Froome, who also rides for Ineos, was ruled out because of a horrific crash last month.

Despite his lack of experience — he will start his second Grand Tour — Bernal is showing an impressive maturity.

“I think you have a physical age and a mental age, but when you’re ready, you’re ready,” Ineos team boss Dave Brailsford said yesterday. “He’s ready.”

Many former Tour winners including Eddy Merckx and Alberto Contador have picked Bernal as their favorite to win a race that features several grueling mountainous stages this year. They expect the diminutive Colombian climber to grab the spotlight when the Tour reaches the high-altitude summits in the last 10 days of racing.

Before that, there will be many opportunities for the 33 riders making their first Tour appearance to show off their skills and challenge the supremacy of their elders — starting Saturday.

“We will see riders who dare to attack, who try their luck, riders who race in an old-fashioned way,” Tour director Christian Prudhomme said.

The opening stage features two short climbs usually taken during the oneday classic Ronde van Vlaanderen and a stretch of cobblestones and also passes through Merckx’s childhood home.