Belgium races are considered some of the hardest and toughest to be found anywhere, and today Dwars door Vlaanderen was quintessential Belgium racing: rain, cold, and relentless cobbled steep climbs all on narrow, twisting roads. It all resulted in an epic, hard man’s race.

Trek Factory Racing came into today’s 200-kilometer Flanders Classic with lofty goals and motivation high, but left the race battered, bruised and licking wounds instead.

“It was one of these days,” sighed sport director Dirk Demol after the epic race had finished to the Trek website. “We had big ambitions coming in with Giacomo [Nizzolo] on some good form, and Stijn [Devolder] ready to go.  So after 15 kilometers in the race we had a crash with two of us down – Markel [Irizar] and Giacomo.  Giacomo took the worst, damaging his knee, so he had to abandon immediately. We will have to wait to hear the diagnosis on that – there is nothing broken but we will have to wait to see in next days how he is. He was the team leader for Sunday [Gent–Wevelgem] so we are crossing our fingers that the damage is not so bad.”

“Markel was able to come back,” he continued, “but then later Danny van Poppel was involved in a crash and his bike was broken. Since I was car 15 it takes forever before you can get to him, so the race was also over for him.”

“Then Stijn was coming back into the race after missing the split on the climb, and he was giving me a good impression in the chasing group of 11 or 12 riders until he crashed in the downhill after the Paterberg, almost in the same spot as last year in the Tour of Flanders.

“We have to wait to see what the damage is…he was back on the bike and finished but he had no idea that he had crashed - or how. So that means we have to go to the hospital now and assess the injuries. Also his elbow – the same side he crashed last year at Tour of Flanders. It’s a bad day.”

Stijn Devolder was one of around 20 riders still in the game as the race was reaching its critical moments with some 30 kilometers to go. He led the decimated chase group on the descent after the Paterberg when his tires slid out in the corner’s apex – the exact same corner where Lars Boom (Astana) had gone down moments earlier, and strangely almost the same place where Devolder had crashed in the Tour of Flanders last year. Boom was still picking himself out of the farmer’s field when Devolder came sliding into the same piece of real estate.

It was a nasty fall. But Devolder , hard man extraordinaire, hopped back into the saddle to finish the race as a cold rain began to come down again. Bloody, bruised and covered in mud he pedaled to the end.

“For Stijn to finish was incredible!" exclaimed Dirk Demol, shaking his head. “I don’t think many other riders in the peloton would even attempt to get back on the bike; his whole entire left side is damaged, and he was very dizzy - he may have been unconscious for a bit. But he said, ‘no, I go on, I try to finish the race.’  Yeah, he’s a tough guy.  I hope though he’s not too bad. We may have to skip [E3] Harelbeke, but hopefully that is all. We shall see.”

When reached for comment after the race Stijn Devolder could not hide his disappointment and managed to utter only a few words before he was hauled off to the hospital for further analysis:

“On the downhill of the Paterberg I crashed. It was a combination of going too fast and slippery in that corner – yeah, it was a hard crash,” he said, admitting that it was indeed painful. “My elbow, my hip, everything is hurting right now. Yeah I guess it’s not my style to stop…it’s disappointing.”

Later, X-rays gave promising news that both Giacomo Nizzolo and Stijn Devolder had no broken bones, but the severity of both crashes left the riders swollen and bruised and only time will tell if they will be able to lineup in the next days’ races.

For Devolder, it was a case of déjà vu: he injured the same elbow in almost the exact same place as last year’s Tour of Flanders crash which caused him to miss Paris-Roubaix.  A repeat of last year would be devastating to the Belgian.

But with a bloody and puffy lip to match his swollen elbow and all the other scrapes he sustained in his high-speed fall, Stijn was encouraged and confident by the news of no broken bones – for a hard man that means ride on!