“The return begins now,” Belgian cyclist Remco Evenepoel said on Wednesday, the day after his training accident.
“After a scary accident that happened yesterday during training, I had surgery last night (editor’s note: Tuesday) and everything went well,” posted the Soudal Quick team rider from his hospital bed. Step on his X account, thanking the many people who sent him messages of support.
“With fractures to a rib, shoulder blade and hand, bruising to the lungs and a dislocation of the right clavicle which caused a tear of all the surrounding ligaments, the road will be long, but I am fully focused on my recovery and I am determined to come back stronger, step by step,” summed up Evenepoel.
While training alone on Tuesday in the Gooik region, northwest of Brussels, the 2022 world champion, aged 24, was unable to avoid a Belgian post car, including the postwoman suddenly opened the door as the runner was about to pass it.
The double Olympic champion of Paris 2024 has not been spared from falls since the start of his career, the most serious having occurred during the Tour of Lombardy in 2020, in the descent of the Mur de Sormano. After a plunge of around ten meters into the void, he suffered a major fracture of the pelvis and damage to his lungs.
This year, at the beginning of April, he was caught in a heavy collective fall during the Tour of the Basque Country, already fracturing his collarbone and right shoulder blade.
