Wout van Aert has detailed his recollection of the horror crash at Dwars door Vlaanderen that saw him break his collarbone, seven ribs and his sternum, which forced him to end his spring Classics campaign and skip a planned Giro d’Italia debut.
The Belgian star spoke as the centrepiece of Visma-Lease a Bike’s new documentary, 'The Spring Classics: ROAD TO RESILIENCE – Inside The Beehive', which was released on YouTube yesterday and provides unique insight into the team’s first half of the season.
It opens with Van Aert’s crash which occurred 67km from the finish of the one-day Classic and shows the moments leading up to it in Visma’s pre-race team meetings, the reaction from the team car and race footage of the incident itself.
“Shit. That’s the end of the Spring Classics… Also no Giro,” said Visma directeur sportif Grischa Niermann moments after the crash, clearly aware of the severity of Van Aert’s injuries from his initial assessment and the cries of pain let out by the Belgian.
“Of course, I was very shocked at first,” said Van Aert. “I immediately wanted to get to the side of the road. When I tried to move, I felt there was something wrong with my shoulder and hip.
“Then I experienced tremendous pain until I received some strong medication at the hospital so that first half hour was truly terrible.”
Jorgenson’s solo win was the “small consolation” for the Dutch team who now knew the road ahead would be tough with a heavily hampered team for both the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix.
“From that moment on we had mixed feelings. We win the race, a brilliant finale by Tiesj and Matteo,” Zeeman said. “But on the other hand, my thoughts are also very much with Wout. With his wife, his family.”
“They could almost diagnose the collarbone fracture themselves, but it was confirmed by the X-rays,” Van Aert said. “They said my ribs could have been affected too but then the next doctor came and said I had seven broken ribs and it turned out that my sternum was also broken.”
With Van Aert out of the Classics lineup and other top riders Christophe Laporte and Dylan van Baarle also suffering their own issues with illness and injury, Visma entered the first cobbled Monument with a largely hampered team.
“The Tour of Flanders was the first day I was home,” said Van Aert. “You still want to see how your teammates are doing.
“I couldn’t really get out of the chair at that moment, so it was even harder to avoid the race on the most important Sunday of the year.”
Without their Belgian star, Visma faded under the pressure of his long-term rival Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck), who attacked away from Jorgenson and the rest of the field on the Koppenberg with 45km to go.
It was a similar story come Paris-Roubaix just a week later, with Van der Poel going solo from even further out, 60km from the fabled velodrome. Van Aert again had to watch from the sidelines but found it even more difficult to stomach than missing his home race.
“I wasn’t home for Roubaux, I followed it from a distance,” he said. “Maybe I found that even harder. The realisation started to sink in that I was still very tired and needed a lot of care for my wounds.
“I was still far from training while watching one of the most beautiful races of the year. That was mentally the hardest moment for me in the past weeks.”
Van Aert has provided regular updates during his road to recovery, with a recent first ride outdoors being a big moment in his rehabilitation. He's gone from walking again to riding on a modified mountain bike and most recently, Cerveló's Áspero 5 Gravel Bike.
“According to the people guiding me, my recovery is progressing well," Van Aert said. "It is definitely a great feeling to put on the cycling shorts again, although that was quite a challenge as well.
“Then it quickly becomes confronting that I might have been in my best condition ever and suddenly I’m knocked back to the worst possible condition.”
No date has been scheduled for Van Aert’s return to racing with a debut at the Giro ruled out. He could ride the Tour de France but his remaining key goal for the 2024 season will be the Paris Olympic Games where he’ll target the road race and time trial.
