Niko Eeckhout of the An Post – Sean Kelly Team rode the Brabantse Pijl and the GP Denain in the middle of the week with a broken vertebrae. The Belgian hardman was in the right break in Brabant with the eventual top three, Sebastian Rosseler (RadioShack), Thomas De Gent (Topsport Vlaanderen-Mercator) and Jurgen Van De Walle (Quick Step), but had to drop out during the race.
He had a good reason to abandon both races due to his painful injury, which was made worse by the Belgian roads. “The pain was unbearable,” said Eeckhout to Sporza. “Every dent in the road caused so much grief that I abandoned on Wednesday and on Thursday. I was really discouraged as I had good legs.”
The problems were already caused by an accident a couple of weeks ago. “It’s all a result from a crash in the GP Cerami in the beginning of April,” Eeckhout said.
On Friday, an X-ray revealed the fracture of one vertebrae, with another one squashed. “I can’t be on my bike for ten days and can only rest. After that another X-ray will be done.” Eeckhout said.