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Vande Velde's View: Crash, bang, oooomph!
Day two is over and done with and apart from four of us hitting the deck thus far, all is well.
Stuey went down in the prologue, Kurt went down trying to protect Carlos' wheel, Frank went down in the rain while trying to navigate through a roundabout and then Fabian went down in the big crash near the finish.
We were talking at breakfast this morning and commiserating for the poor guys who he landed on. Fabian went over the top like Walter Payton into the end zone, landing his big 86-kilo Swiss cheese ass on top of all of those tiny little men.
The Swiss bear was down but not out; he came back to dinner, loud as ever, turning on Shakira full blast during dinner. And to make it worse, he tries to sing along.
The rest of us were behind the crash and we were all relieved to tell you the truth. The suffering was over and done with and within the last 3k so all was good.
Then the day ended up perfect for the fans as well with Gert Steegmans kicking Boonen to the curb. They both seemed happy, but something tells me that Gert was happier than Tomke. But Tom has techo-pop songs named after him, so he doesn't even have to win anymore.
We have controlled the race without spending too much energy and will continue to do so until we reach the point of no return. In other words, we won't destroy the team to defend the jersey for one more day.
Today we can expect 235km of wind and most likely rain. I will be on the front line at the start, as usual.
Watch video of Christian after stage 3.
