The Crash

Monday, June 02, 2003
I have been sitting in Ruben and Rein’s house for 4 days now with my broken collarbone. It is very boring to be in a country to race and not be able to ride a bike. I would love to travel also but it is just too hard to move and it is also hard to shower. On Wednesday I will see the doctor again and hopefully he will say I am healing fast
On Thursday at Hasselt spa Hasselt I was racing well and felt really good my legs were just starting to come around. I had made the front group. I was very thirsty and wanted a feed bad. I left a lot of space between my teammate and I in the break. Other riders were doing very strange things in the feed swerving every which way and looking backwards. It is hard to find my soginer Tom because he always seems to be hiding while giving out feeds. I spotted him just as my teammate Paul was receiving his feed. Paul had almost stopped to get the feed. I didn’t want to have to chase after the feed so I was moving fast. Tom watched as Paul rode away and didn’t look for me so I yelled his name so maybe I would get the feed. Tom had the feedbags in his left hand near the ground. He grabbed one and moved it quickly from left to right. It looked to me that it was ether going in my wheel or hitting my handle bars. I thought I could save myself by grabbing it and razing it above my bars. But Tom had the bag so low that I grabbed the top of the string and could not raise it fast enough. it slammed my bars and I lost control landing on my head and shoulder breaking the collar bone and scrapping up my right side. It was a horrible day.