There was drama and a 'devastated' Belgian junior rider at the UCI Road World Championships, with a mechanical mix-up that meant his bike was deemed illegal by race officials.
Jens Verbrugghe, son of the Israel-Premier Tech director Rik, still competed in Tuesday's junior men's time trial at Worlds, but did so on an unfamiliar bike belonging to his national federation.
That's because he initially turned up for the time trial with a 53-tooth chainring, which is above the UCI limit on gearing for junior riders.
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According to reports in the Belgian press, his Lapierre bike passed the preliminary checks by officials, but the illegal gear was then spotted in the final pre-race check 10 minutes before his start. He then had to scramble to fetch a Ridley bike and went on to finish in 26th place – way down on his hopes after winning silver at the European Championships.
Verbrugghe's disappointment was evident at the finish line as he slumped his head over the handlebars of his new bike, and was described as "completely devastated" by Belgian technical director Frederik Broché.
"It's a shame we're being looked at as if we have something to hide. But that's not true," said Broché, according to Het Laatste Nieuws.
"Malicious intent seems out of the question to me. I really don't believe that. Jens is 17 years old and is completely devastated."
There was confusion over how Verbrugghe's bike came to be set up with an illegal gear.
Verbrugghe rides for the Groupama-FDJ junior set-up and Broché suggested that it may have been set up by the team in advance of next year, when the UCI will lift its restrictions on junior gearing.
"In the ideal world, we would have seen this, but our mechanics have assembled 120 bicycles here. We assume that the bicycles will arrive with the correct gears," Broché said.
"There is no malicious intent involved here. This is a human error on the part of several people: the rider, the mechanic of his team, our people. We are not going to point the finger at anyone, it is a shared responsibility."
