Annemiek van Vleuten’s dramatic World Championships crash — confirms front tyre didn’t “explode” before fall; Bauke Mollema suffers untimely mechanical… later collides with seagull; Angle grinder bike thefts are back + more on the live blog
SUMMARY
Annemiek van Vleuten's dramatic World Championships crash after "front tyre exploded" straight off the start ramp
Annemiek van Vleuten — the all-conquering winner of all three of this year’s women’s Grand Tour replicas, including the Tour de France Femmes — crashed out of the World Championships mixed relay time trial this morning (UK time) and says she is on the way to hospital for X-rays. Her right side is heavily bruised, the prolific winner who will retire at the end of next season said, and she is “especially worried about my right elbow and arm”.
⚠️ CRASH for @AvVleuten!! ⚠️
Mechanical issue causes horrible crash for the Dutch superstar.
Really disappointing day for the Dutch. #Wollongong2022 pic.twitter.com/rU5LYNnlcu— UCI (@UCI_cycling) September 21, 2022
In the same social media post updating fans about her condition, Van Vleuten said the crash happened when her “front tyre exploded”. With the challenging road race on Saturday all we can do is hope one of the biggest names in the sport is on the startline to continue her sensational season…
> From Coppi to Van Vleuten: Cycling’s greatest ever seasons
It was a nightmare afternoon/morning (depending on your time zone) for the Dutch in the new(ish) mixed relay time trial — the event which replaced the team time trial a few years back and involves three male riders from a nation riding a TT before three women finish it off, starting when the men have completed their course.
Things went wrong for the riders in orange from the start ramp — Bauke Mollema’s chain getting snagged, although sadly no repeat of his hilarious sponsor-bashing outburst at the 2019 Giro…”I always ride with (SRAM) 1x (no derailleur). First time this happens this year. Bad luck at the worst moment,” he said after today’s mechanical.
Nightmare for the Dutch as Bauke Mollema drops his chain very early on the team mixed team time trial. Great news for Australia who sit in the hot seat. #Wollongong2022 #cycling pic.twitter.com/rmIZ4cV0n0
— Brendan Bradford (@1bbradfo) September 21, 2022
Images you can hear. #Mollema #SRAM #Wollongong2022 pic.twitter.com/yXopGGfMpa
— Mihai Simion (@faustocoppi60) September 21, 2022
Anyway, on the seventh anniversary of ‘Ronnie Pickering’ going viral, here’s everybody’s second favourite vid…
Oh, you want to know who actually won the mixed relay? Sorry, now we’ve got that stuff out the way I’ll tell you…
It was Swiss dominance, powered by European champion Marlen Reusser and nearly man Stefan Küng. Pretty strong back-up too when you can call on Stefan Bissegger, Mauro Schmid, Nicole Koller and Elise Chabbey for support.
> “It was terrifying”: Remco Evenepoel and World Championships pros suffer magpie attacks
Italy missed out on the win by three seconds, while home favourites Australia did enough to earn bronze, 38 seconds behind their Swiss rivals…. and breathe. That’s a lot of drama for before 9am…
Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse...
— Cycling out of context (@OutOfCycling) September 21, 2022
And to think the magpies have been getting all the bad press…
> “It was terrifying”: Remco Evenepoel and World Championships pros suffer magpie attacks
"I don't know what happened but it looks like the tyre exploded after I hit the side of the road"
Don’t know what happened but looks the tire exploded after I did hit the side of the road. So that was not the problem. Something caused I got out of balance, but what ever caused it: it will not help or change my situation. Now in the hospital. 🤞🤞 https://t.co/ApGAY4YITt
— Annemiek van Vleuten (@AvVleuten) September 21, 2022
Bauke Mollema: pro cyclist and enemy of avian life
This happened yesterday…shared on Bauke Mollema’s Insta…
Birds, birds, birds: Bauke Mollema aangevallen door Australische ekster #Wollongong2022
👇https://t.co/hQ2afX0dEg pic.twitter.com/1bgzn8Jxnq
— Sporza 🚴 (@sporza_koers) September 20, 2022
What did poor Bauke do in a previous life to be Australian birds’ public enemy number one?
UCI president David Lappartient has been on the receiving end too…
David Lappartient…”I feel very safe riding in Wollongong…except for the birds!” 🤣 @wollongong2022 @UCI_cycling
— Cadel Evans (@CadelOfficial) September 20, 2022
Australia’s got a history of tough cycling laws and hefty fines, but enlisting your wildlife for a campaign of physical and psychological attacks is a step too far, surely?
Can confirm (Parkes St, Port Kembla) pic.twitter.com/L7DPWWYXEK
— Lambeaux (@MicahLambert) September 20, 2022
Angle grinder bike thefts are back
In fairness, I doubt they ever went away, we just didn’t see them.
Bike theft Happened in the crouch end yesterday evening at 6pm pic.twitter.com/Au2if5GuXs
— London & UK Street News (@CrimeLdn) September 21, 2022
More footage of bike thieves using an angle grinder to cut through locks and take a bicycle, this time in Crouch End, north London. We’ve already covered multiple incidents of similar offending, often in London, this year, including back in March when a group, unfazed by the growing crowd of onlookers, cut through locks.
It’s not just London, however. A month earlier in Edinburgh footage emerged of hooded thieves using an angle grinder to try to steal a nurse’s bike from a busy city centre street. Fortunately, in that case, they were thwarted by passers by.
Last year one of our most read stories was the footage of a brazen bike thief using an angle grinder to steal a Trek bike locked outside busy shopping centre in south east London.
"101,000 views of people being normal"
Now 101k views of people being normal https://t.co/c5Y7RX1uCM
— Ned Boulting (@nedboulting) September 21, 2022
The most-prized signature in cycling? Wout van Aert extends Jumbo-Visma contract until 2026
𝙁𝙖𝙧 𝙛𝙧𝙤𝙢 𝙙𝙤𝙣𝙚. #WOUT2026 pic.twitter.com/TCiXQ0hPw4
— Team Jumbo-Visma cycling (@JumboVismaRoad) September 21, 2022
Two more years of Wout van Aert being an absolute cycling god in the yellow of Jumbo-Visma? Oh go on then…
The men’s MVP has extended his deal, which would have expired in 2024, to the end of 2026, saying he is “obviously happy” to stay with the team where he “can perform at my best”.
“It surprised me the team wanted to negotiate my contract again, but it’s a nice recognition. We quickly agreed. I don’t think a longer partnership poses any risks because we’ve been able to get better for the past four years,” Wout said.
Ready for dubious quote of the day? Here goes…
“One of the team’s slogans is ‘better every day’, which is not coming out of thin air. We keep improving in performance, the team’s facilities, everything.”
Thanks for that, Jumbo comms manager…sorry, I mean Wout…
Anyway, thinking about what Wout’s palmares might look like come December 2026 is enough to makes us, and the entire peloton, shudder… Flanders? Roubaix? Rainbow jersey? Five green jerseys?
Staff bikes: Dave's custom Dward singlespeed — a steel beauty
Van Vleuten fractured elbow confirmed by Dutch team — BUT "road race remains an option"
In the last few minutes the Dutch cycling federation has released the following statement:
After her fall in today’s Mixed Team Relay, Annemiek van Vleuten will remain in the selection of the KNWU for the world championship on the road in Wollongong (Australia). A (stable) fracture in the elbow has been detected in the Olympic time trial champion. A final decision on whether or not to participate in the road race will be made later this week.
National coach Loes Gunnewijk said a decision will be made in consultation with the team doctor and Van Vleuten over the next few days.
“Annemiek is allowed to cycle with this stable fracture, but the question is of course with how much pain that will be. We will see that in the coming days. We hope that Annemiek can still start, but that has to be justified,” she said.
Accidental shift? Chain jam? Tubeless "explosion"? What caused Annemiek van Vleuten's crash?
Speculation and amateur detective work have been underway since the early morning… Annemiek van Vleuten’s initial suspicion was her front tyre had “exploded”, a conclusion presumably reached by the state of her wheel…
(I guess it is sensitive content if you’re a tubeless fan)
— Jose Sion (@Yayosion) September 21, 2022
Ik hoop heel hard voor u dat alles uiteindelijk meevalt. Vingers kruisen dan maar. Dat je op zaterdag toch uw kansen kan verdedigen en nog eens lekker ouderwets op die pedalen kan rammen. Ben net zoals de hele wieler wereld benieuwd naar het uiteindelijke medische bulletin. pic.twitter.com/kTGFPwcPKh
— franck vanneste (@sprezaturra) September 21, 2022
The Dutch favourite has since said the damage, like her ripped off rear derailleur, was caused by her bike’s impact with the road/barriers and was not the issue that caused her to fall. So what caused the sudden lurch? Social media rumours have suggested a chain jam or cleat pulled from the pedal, the former supported by this extremely grainy still…
appears the chain jumped to the small chainring… putting down all these watts will throw you off, full stop pic.twitter.com/NbQZ8I1eWp
— oh dear… (@oh_dear66) September 21, 2022
Gkam84 in the blog comments suggested an accidental gear change could have been to blame: “Having watched it a number of times over, the only thing I can think happened to AVV, as she was getting ready to change position, she accidentally downshifted the front (if she had switches on her brakes) and it caused her to lose her balance from the unexpected shift. Certainly as she has corrected, the tyre wasn’t blown until the bike his the kerb and smashed the wheel up.”
Rendel Harris added: “Looks to me like a highside potentially caused by the back wheel locking up, bad shift temporarily caught the chain and locked the wheel?”
Cyclocross World Cup round moved from London to Dublin
No pre-Christmas ‘cross in the capital this year, after all. I mean, I’m sure you can find a cyclocross race to watch, but the world’s best almost certainly won’t be there…
No cyclocross World Cup in London.
But to Dublin.
Maasmechelen replaces Rucphen.
Gavere replaces Dendermonde pic.twitter.com/jLqdEVdhWm
— José Been (@TourDeJose) September 21, 2022
The early December round has gone to Dublin instead, the Irish capital is always worth a visit…although if bike racing’s your primary motivation you might as well head to Belgium. It might even be closer to your house…
Anyway, opinion is split here in the road.cc office… Liam is gutted to be missing out on racing the support event…BUT on the bright side, a change of location means Northern Ireland-based Ryan’s eyeing up a trip south.
The Birds: starring Bauke Mollema
Remake > original
(Sorry @BaukeMollema, we had to do it 😜)#Wollongong2022 pic.twitter.com/elwGp4NbAP
— Trek-Segafredo (@TrekSegafredo) September 21, 2022
Entries for 2023 RideLondon-Essex 100 open on Wednesday 28 September
Entries for next year’s RideLondon, to be held on Sunday 28 May, open a week today. The first 10,000 places will be available on a first come, first served basis on Wednesday 28 September (we will try to find out the exact time entries open), with the remaining places then decided by a ballot, which will close at 17:00 on Friday 28 October.
We’ll let you make your own mind up about paying the £99 it costs to ride the event, but once again RideLondon says the 100-mile challenge will start and finish in central London and include a loop of Essex, offering riders 100 miles of traffic-free roads.
Last year’s inaugural event using the Essex loop saw 22,367 participants take on either the 100, 60 or 30-mile events.
Time for another bank holiday? Celebrating seven years of Ronnie Pickering
While the person on the receiving end of this most famous of road rage confrontations was a motorbiker, of course cyclists the world over can relate to the exchange… and therefore, regular Twitter and cycling Twitter alike have been marking Ronnie Pickering Day, because it’s exactly seven years since the fiery footage first emerged…
Happy Ronnie Pickering Day to all those who observe it pic.twitter.com/P8yY9tnOBa
— Lucie Fur (@Lucie_Fur99) September 21, 2022
Should really have a bank holiday for Ronnie Pickering Day
— Tim (@piearce9) September 21, 2022
‘Do you know who I am? Ronnie Pickering!’ but it’s performed by an Indie Band pic.twitter.com/vMN5rgaMh3
— Michael Fry (@BigDirtyFry) January 9, 2021
A lot of analysis and a whole load of memes have appeared in those seven years, and last year the incident was even immortalised in song by comedian Michael Fry, who performed the entire exchange in the style of a noughties landfill indie band.
If you prefer your victims of road rage to be riding bikes without motors, check out some of our Ronnie Pickering-esque greatest hits. Happy Ronnie Pickering Day!
> Driver aims ‘can-can’ kick at cyclist, misses – and falls on his backside
> Ronnie Pickering, eat your heart out: the angry canal man
> Road rage meltdown driver who threatened to kill cyclist fined for public order offence
21 September 2022, 08:13
21 September 2022, 08:13
21 September 2022, 08:13
21 September 2022, 08:13
Help us to bring you the best cycling content
If you’ve enjoyed this article, then please consider subscribing to road.cc from as little as £1.99. Our mission is to bring you all the news that’s relevant to you as a cyclist, independent reviews, impartial buying advice and more. Your subscription will help us to do more.
15 Comments
Read more...
Read more...
Read more...
Latest Comments
@mitsky Its another one of those things that makes no sense isn't it. Someone was saying in another thread that we need a harder driving test. I don't think we do. Everyone who has passed in the last 20 years has done a test that is more than happy to fail you for behaviour that 90% of drivers exhibit every time they get behind the wheel. The test is fine. The fact that getting your license seems to be considered some weird proof that you will continue to drive safely is the issue. The fact that when you prove that you cannot drive safely its not immediately revoked is the issue.
@Rendel Harris The issue with GPS chips, as everyone who has one of those black boxes will attest to, is that they are crap. They interpret heavy braking as poor driving rather than someone else forcing it. They see rapid acceleration where there is none. All we need is a much higher chance of people being caught and punished for their everyday shit driving. I'm sure as a cyclist that every single time you go out on your bike you will have a dozen or more times when you think "that would have been a nasty accident if someone was coming the other direction". Eventually, when bad behaviour suffers no consequences it becomes completely normalised. Then we struggle to treat it as anything but a normal, unavoidable accident when that bad behaviour does incur consequences.
Drivers regularly pull out in front of me and cause me to slam on the brakes or avoid them. Very often they have seen me and just assume I'm not going very fast or they assume I will slow down/stop (which I do). Too many drivers don't look for cyclists, hate giving way to them or expect the cyclist to be moving slowly and just pull out.
@Rendel Harris By the time someone is looking at prison time its too late. As has been proven time and time again, the severity of punishment is a poor deterrent to bad behaviour if people don't think its going to happen to them or they don't think they will be caught. Now I do think that there should be far more severe and immediate punishments for bad driving when drivers are caught but this would need to be coupled with a massive push to actually act on information/proof of bad driving. As anyone that submits footage to the police knows, its a crapshoot and certain police forces are anti-cyclist. This would try to essentially put people off misbehaving whilst driving before they cause an accident rather than getting the tired old excuse of "it was a single dangerous incident, they definitely don't do this all the time and their luck finally ran out". Perhaps it should go even further and if you have a history of speeding and you hurt someone speeding, that is looked upon in a very dim light.
Can we talk about “Washing up liquid contains a lot of salt – not a great idea to use a corrosive substance on a bicycle”? This is an urban myth. I have washed all of our many bikes using Fairy liquid or Ecover for decades. I’ve never found any evidence of corrosion, paint, laquer or decal wear, or any sign of anything. I regularly service forks and bearings, swapping a lot of gear, and everything has always been fine. Here’s far too much info below - long story short, Fairy liquid in 5L of hot water has a borderline-homeopathic amount of salt, it’s fine to use on a bike. ============ The honest answer is that neither Fairy nor Ecover publicly disclose the actual sodium chloride concentration in the consumer products I could find. The safety data sheets list hazardous ingredients above reporting thresholds, but sodium chloride is not reported for either product. However, we can put some realistic bounds on it. Fairy Original The SDS lists: Sodium laureth sulfate: 20-30% Lauramine oxide: 5-10% Alcohol: 1-5% No sodium chloride is declared. 15 In detergent formulations, sodium chloride is commonly used as a viscosity modifier (thickener) and is typically present at around 0.5-3%, sometimes lower. The absence of declaration suggests it is either not present or present at a low concentration that does not require reporting. This range is an informed formulation estimate, not a value stated by Fairy. Ecover The Ecover ingredient information lists: Sodium lauryl sulfate Lauryl glucoside Cocamidopropyl betaine Alcohol Lactic acid Sodium octyl sulphate Again, no sodium chloride is listed. Ecover's formulations tend to rely more heavily on plant-derived surfactants and may use little or no salt for thickening, but I could not find a published concentration. 63 What does this mean for bike washing? Let's assume a worst-case 3% salt content in Fairy. If you add: 10 mL Fairy to a 5-litre bucket Then salt introduced would be approximately: 10 mL × 3% ≈ 0.3 g salt Distributed through 5 L water ≈ 60 mg/L salt For comparison: Typical seawater: ~35,000 mg/L Lightly salted winter road spray: often hundreds to thousands of mg/L The wash bucket above: ~60 mg/L So even under a pessimistic assumption, the salt concentration is hundreds to thousands of times lower than the salt exposure your bike gets from winter roads. From a corrosion perspective, the quantity of salt introduced by washing-up liquid is essentially negligible compared with: Riding on salted roads Coastal spray Leaving winter grime on the bike Therefore my practical conclusion remains: ✅ Fairy or Ecover in a wash bucket is extremely unlikely to contribute any measurable corrosion risk. ✅ The important thing is rinsing and drying afterwards. ✅ Winter road salt is the real enemy, not washing-up liquid.
Another example of a driver's actions that would have been a straight fail in a driving test but is barely likely to lead to a disqualification... I'm wondering if having a driving licence is like a "Get out of jail free" card...
Yes indeed. I have a version of the R8100 and you definitively need ceramic for the socket.
@perce I'm not sure I agree with that. I think thats just confirming that he is take fully responsibility and recognises that the cyclist could have done nothing to mitigate it.
If we don't fight it now, we'll all end up forced to wear baggy shorts!
@Rendel Harris Agree, I am baffled that the 84 year old who is now banned from driving for year can then start driving again without a retest. We should be re-tested regularly.
15 thoughts on “Annemiek van Vleuten’s dramatic World Championships crash — confirms front tyre didn’t “explode” before fall; Bauke Mollema suffers untimely mechanical… later collides with seagull; Angle grinder bike thefts are back + more on the live blog”
https://www.gazette-news.co
https://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/22314427.essex-cyclist-awarded-800k-devastating-collision/
800k seems a bit light to me, although it doesn’t say the age of the cyclist.
5 years to get a settlement !
First comment on there BTL is
First comment on there BTL is anti vaxxer and the second is how its just an advert for ambulance chasers… Gotta love those Colchesterites!
Colcestrians (door mirror)
Colcestrians (door mirror)
(wing mirror)
(wing mirror)
Thanks for flagging that one,
Thanks for flagging that one, it’s on the news list.
It took 4 years to get my
It took 4 years to get my settlement – even with admission of guilt and no mitigating circumstances.
I know the hoops I had to crawl through for my £100k plus compensation, and I know how fecked up I am as a result.
£800k says to me that the victim was severely injured and will never, ever have a decent quality of life.
I really wish the guy the best, and hope that the award can get them a decent level of care for as long as they need it.
I wonder why the Crouch End
I wonder why the Crouch End thieves started to go one way, then turned and went the other (making sure they were seen by even more witnesses)? Looked like they had a mechanical… Who would have imagined that angle grinding a bike lock off might cause damage to the bike…?
The replies though…
The replies though…
Apparently it is easy to take down someone with an angle grinder and there is no way you will be injured in such an action.
I don’t know about you, but I
I don’t know about you, but I bl00dy well wouldn’t try it.
Not me – too slow for that.
Not me – too slow for that.
Reckon AlsoSomniloquism’s wife would wade in though !
Having watched it a number of
Having watched it a number of times over, the only thing I can think happened to AVV, as she was getting ready to change position, she accidentally downshifted the front (if she had switches on her brakes) and it caused her to lose her balance from the unexpected shift. Certainly as she has corrected, the tyre wasn’t blown until the bike his the kerb and smashed the wheel up.
Look to me like a highside
Look to me like a highside potentially caused by the back wheel locking up, bad shift temporarily caught the chain and locked the wheel?
Any reason given for the
Any reason given for the Cyclocross calendar change ? As in effectively is it a postponement or cancellation that impacts whether it reappears on next years calendar.
FWIW I think I’m closer to the Belgian coast as the crow flies, than London by road/train distance anyway.
Awavey wrote:
No reason given but in the statement it said they will continue working towards including London on the 23/24 calendar, so hopefully all is not lost. Shame, I was looking forward to that, I know we are spoilt for most things in London (so I don’t expect anyone to shed too many tears for us) but top-class cycle racing isn’t one of them.
those bike thieves – I could
those bike thieves – I could think of a thousand unpleasant things that could be done to them. It’s that they get away with it so often that infuriates.