One of the most horrific crashes in cycling. Dylan Groenewegen of Jumbo-Visma drifted off his line in the sprint, forcing Fabio Jakobsen ever closer to the barriers until he had nowhere to go, smashing into them at nearly 80kph/49mph. Jakobsen suffered horrific injuries, he was air-lifted to hospital where he remained in an induced coma for a couple of days.

    Jakobson, 23, suffered broken bones in his face and lost all his teeth. Speaking to the Polish media, Pawel Gruenpeter of Sosnowiec hospital explained he was now breathing on his own and concious, there were no indications of brain or spinal cord damage which is a tremdous relief.

    Eye witnesses described it as a shocking, terrible scene to see. A race official, also struck in the collision, suffered head and spinal injuries but was concious when taken to hospital.

    A statement from cycling’s governing body reads “The UCI, which considers the behaviour unacceptable, immediately referred the matter to the disciplinary commission to request the imposition of sanctions commensurate with the seriousness of the facts.”

    Jumbo-Visma said: “Our thoughts go out to Fabio Jakobsen and other people involved in today’s terrible crash in the Tour of Poland – crashes like these should not happen. We offer our sincere apologies and we will discuss internally what has happened before we may make any further statement.”

    38 Comments

    1. I can imagine that adrenaline runs high when racing. Even in fast group rides my adrenaline runs high. With that being said I do not think Dylan did this on purpose however, I do think that he caused this incident due to the ego getting the best of him and simply not letting Jakobsen win. This win that es not even his anymore, cost him possibly more than his career in cycling. Just not worth it.
      Hoping for Jakobsen's speedy recovery.

    2. Holy Crap! 100% intent with this move. I suspect a lengthy ban will be in order. It's pretty sickening what such high levels of competitiveness can do to some people's decision making, and for what?

    3. If i recall correctly. Peter sagan and elia viviani were disqualified or given suspension or warning due to sudden manuver on finishing line. Remember what happened to mark Cavendish ?

    4. Race organizers deserve part of the blame for those flimsy, flimsy barriers. In the heat of the moment, these guys are competitive, I don't think you can blame Gorenwegen for trying to hold his lead. There's no way Gorenwegen could have predicted how bad that crash would be, I don't think he was even trying to crash him, just get him off his ass.

    5. Gets caught in the barriers 'really' jees

      The barriers move 'WHAT B.S'

      The rider was forced into the stationary barriers by another rider who should NEVER ever be allowed to compete again…only he is. What a joke !

    6. The UCI needs to address this issue ASAP. In this day and age, to still have such primitive barriers in place at sprint finishes is absurd and unacceptable. The barriers along the last 250M or so of all finishes (other than mountain stage finishes) should be higher, completely padded, and completely smooth with no braces visible that a rider or bike can possibly get entangled with. The consequence of falling into such a barrier should be that the padding absorbs some of the kinetic energy of the rider and then the rider slides/falls back down onto the roadway.

    7. Former lawyer here. Only a 9 month ban?! WTF? Should be aggravated assault (or even attempted manslaughter) charges brought against Groenewegen.

      Agree also they need to up their barrier game.

    8. How fast are they going here would someone say roughly ? Clearly fast I’m just wondering how fast these guys can make them things go

    9. I came here, because of the new Netflix doc, where they also showed this crash. I gotta say even though i have almost no knowledge about this sport, its still super interesting to watch this new documentary, cause it gives a real interesting insight & view on things. Im hooked😅

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