UCI - Gran Fondo World Series - Belgium

Probably the worst race I ever attended, not only due to the crash ...

It was a last minute decision, I bought someone's ticket as the original distance of 180km with 2500m of elevation had changed into 140km with 1450Hm, much more made for me.
After my great race at Gravel Turnhout I got sick 2 days later, viral infection and fever + also an issue with my left tigh (contraction ?), at the end of that week I couldn't ride a bike anymore nor get down the stairs. After 3 weeks it was becoming better so I was planning to use this race as an extra training session to get back in shape ...

But it didn't went as planned, a "huge" crash after only 8km made the race cancelled after 17km, there were no ambulances anymore to follow the race.
Crashing is part of racing, but this time the organisation is there to blame, all licensed riders had to start together, from age 19 to 59, men and women, all together. Almost 500 people which is asking for problems.

On the other hand the cancellation was also a bit of shame as I was riding in the leadgroup with only one other rider of my age group (50+), as the pace of that young dudes was way to high I decided to let myself drop on the first big climb, I also saw that the other one was dropped so my chances were still good and I had time to recover, I waited on group 2 which pace was much more ok for me untill we got stopped by marshalls and they told us the race was over, a shame but understandable !

KEYPOINTS :
01:05 already first chaos as the lead car didn't moved in time
11:45 major crash
17:45 detached from the lead group on the 1st climb
20:15 got catched by group 2
28:11 end of the race after 17km