Oliver Naesen has had a very bizarre experience in his hotel room. So the ceiling – plasterboard it seems – fell down in the middle of the night.
Got away well
The incident took place on Tuesday night, the night before Eschborn-Frankfurt where Naesen started. “It was after midnight when suddenly the plaster fell from the ceiling. I was frightened to death. It made so much noise that caregivers from our team also jumped out of their beds and came into the hallway to see what it was,” Naesen tells his story in Het Nieuwsblad.
“A large piece also fell on my ankle, which was scraped, blue and somewhat swollen. It was the only part of my body that wasn’t under the covers.” Although it could have been a lot worse for Naesen.
“My teammate had pushed his bed back a bit. It was lucky that I hadn’t done that, otherwise the adhesive might have ended up on my head. Fortunately not, because there were quite sharp edges.”
That teammate is Stan Dewulf. “My first race of the season and I could have been dead,” he responded to the incident. “When we told reception that our ceiling had come down, all they could do was repeat “what!?”
Hilarity among teammates
Naturally, the rider reported this to reception, where they were equally astonished. “They came rushing up and didn’t know what they saw. We were assigned a different room and our stay was free.”
“But I always sleep for free when I stay in a hotel for a race on behalf of the team (laughs). The colleagues had to laugh when they saw us coming to the breakfast table in white powder the morning of the race.”
