Touching! Taco van Hoorn races with year-and-a-half skull injury and wins solo in Friesland

As one of the last major races in the Netherlands, we sat down to enjoy the spectacle. Not only was there a strong starting list at the start, but also because the flags were flying. And who says Friesland and the Elfstedenrace also says echelons! At 10:45 a.m., the race took off for 199.9 kilometers, and from kilometer zero on, it went hard.

While the first attempt was repaired, it happened again in the direction of IJlst. Here, the peloton tore apart into four pieces. At this stage, it was still mainly a knock-out race, with groups three and four breaking away. Near Stavoren, the first two groups joined together, leaving us just 24 riders after a hundred kilometers. Major casualties: Dylan Groenewegen and Fabio Jakobsen.

In the front group, we did have, among others, Christophe Laporte, Mick van Dijke, Tosh Van der Sande (Visma | Lease a Bike), Nils Eekhoff (dsm-firmenich PostNL), Elmar Reinders (Jayco-AlUla) ánd the recently returned Taco van der Hoorn (Intermarché-Wanty). With that solid leading group, we ended up in a status quo, as the peloton called group two was not much bigger than the group in front. The difference was more than two minutes going into the last thirty kilometers.

The front group seemed to compete for the win, especially when the lead increased to three minutes in the final twenty kilometers. So it was time to attack, with Van der Hoorn getting away with Reinders, Laporte, Jelte Krijnsen, and Lionel Taminiaux. Twelve chasers witnessed it happen and quickly found themselves twenty seconds behind. Problem for the group of five: Reinders. He skipped turns because Max Walscheid had a fast man behind him in group two.

The other four didn't let Reinders' play fool them, and with good teamwork, the gap to the back increased. Especially when there was a hard crash, and the pace completely dropped. The battle was between the five in front, with Van der Hoorn choosing the perfect moment to attack at four kilometers from the finish. The rest all eyed the fast Laporte, but he wouldn't or couldn't. Van der Hoorn was free and could go solo to the finish line. The screams could be heard as far away as Limburg because there was finally nothing wrong with the Dutchman's brain. Krijnsen was cleverly second in the background, ahead of Laporte.