Defending champion Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) is back up and riding after being involved in a big crash at the Tour of Flanders with 126km to go.
Van der Poel was riding towards the back of the peloton with most of his Alpecin-Deceuninck teammates on the approach to the Eikenberg when a crash on the left-hand side of the peloton rippled back through the group and took down several riders, including the former world champion.
He appeared uninjured after crashing onto the grass, jumping straight back on the bike and following teammate Edward Planckaert’s wheel to try and rejoin the peloton.
The likes of Tim Wellens (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), Emīls Liepiņš (Q36.5) and John Degenkolb (Picnic-PostNL) appeared to be more badly affected and stayed down after the crash.
Wellens later also returned to the back of the peloton to help his leader Tadej Pogačar, while Degenkolb was sadly forced to abandon the race. Harry Sweeny (EF Education-EasyPost) also abandoned the race after coming down in the high-speed incident.
With 122km to go, Van der Poel was at the back of the main group but a long way back from key rivals Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), with the steep hellingen and cobbled sectors now coming thick and fast.
By 8km after the crash, the panic, for now, was over for Van der Poel, having got back in the group of favourites and moved again towards the front. With an adrenaline boost, he’ll now try to recover and settle down for the next climbs up the Molenberg and Berendries.
Pogačar’s team, however, took several blows in the approach to the climbs with Jhonatan Narváez and Florian Vermeersch also going down before Wellens at different points. The former was forced to abandon, heavily reducing UAE’s team strength.
With 90km to go, the world champion has only two riders left in the main group of favourites to help him.
