Crocodile Trophy
Outback Adventure - A Day to Remember
John Flynn / 22.10.2009
Medical emergencies, raging bushfires and a full-scale search for missing riders. Australia's Crocodile Trophy has always promised competitors an outback adventure but today, on what was definitely the most dramatic day in the race's history, drama was laid-on for the protagonists in rich helpings. Stage three of the Croc Trophy from Granite Gorge on Australia's Tropical Tableland to Outback Irvinebank was always destined to be eventful, but what unfolded on a stage that was eventually nullified by the race judiciary will be etched forever in the Trophy's colourful history.
The first major incident of the day occurred at the 15 kilometre mark when women's race leader, Monique Zeldenrust of The Netherland punctured a tyre. It was no routine puncture, with the rocky outback trails gouging a sidewall and forcing a lengthy repair.
In the process, Zeldenrust watched her race lead evaporate ... Or so she thought.
Five kilometres beyond the first incident, an emergency of a far more serious kind was unfolding. Again it was a Dutch mountainbiker, Willemjan Hopstaken, who was in trouble. Hopstaken crashed heavily and immediately began suffering seizures.
Fortune was on his side, with two members of Australia's 'Jungle Patrol Wilderness Medicine' team riding close behind. Doctor Andrew Graham and nurse Sharman Parr (the oldest woman in the race) abandoned their personal race ambitions and worked frantically to stabilise the Dutchman's condition.
The on-site treatment prevented a potentially life threatening situation. Hopstaken was later handed over to the race doctor and transported to hospital for scans after sustaining a severe concussion.
A further five kilometres down the trail, the next major drama for the day was already taking shape. The Crocodile Trophy's 'Heads of State' an elite group of eleven cyclists fighting it out for the General Classification missed a clearly marked farm gate and ventured off-course, into the in-hospitable wilderness of the Australian Outback.
The 'Dimbulah Eleven' as they were later dubbed contained a who's who of the 2009 Crocodile Trophy. World and Olympic Champion Bart Brentjens, four-time Race Across America winner Jure Robic and race leader Urs Huber were all present when the group became hopelessly lost.
"It was really like an adventure, we lost the route, we missed an arrow and after that we lost our orientation as well," Brentjens said. "In Holland it is not such a big problem if you're lost, it's small, but here in Australia it can be 100k to the nearest place and that's a long way on the bike."
Playing for high stakes, the lead protagonists continued to race - over barbed wire fences, through cow paddocks and up dry gullies, before realising something had gone dreadfully wrong.
"After about 25 k's we missed a junction and we were walking over barbed wires and they keep going racing," German Kai Hundertmark, the day's early attacker said. "I went, come on men, shut down your brains because we're completely lost." See All Event Posts
