Annemarie Worst (777), the reigning 2019-2020 UCI Cyclocross World Cup champion, was enjoying her first race back after a long pandemic-stricken offseason this past weekend.
Worst was reconnecting with her roots as a mountain biker and contesting the Proffix Swiss Bike Cup in Leukerbad, Switzerland when she crashed badly in the woods.
Worst was descending and coming off a large rock and then went over the bars. “I immediately knew it was wrong,” she said, as reported by Algemeen Dagblad. While she initially feared a broken collarbone, her bones were spared, but her tendons holding her collarbone in place were not.
The Dutch star needed to be hoisted by a winch into a helicopter then evacuated. After her helicopter rescue and Swiss hospital visit, her team drove her over seven hours to a hospital in Belgium for tendon surgery.
“It is my first real injury in my career,” she said [translated]. “But this will take a while. I had planned to cycle on the road, but that is now going to come to an end.”
Worst was slated to team up with other cyclocross stars including rival Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado and Sanne Cant on a new road team.
Rivals Dutch women Ceylin Alvarado and Annemarie Worst were slated to team up together on the road, but that will have to wait a year. photo: 2020 GP Sven Nys, Baal. © B. Hazen / Cyclocross Magazine
Now, an even more eventful offseason will force Worst to recover and refocus on the delayed start of the 2020-2021 cyclocross season. “I hope to end to be at the start of the cross season again in September.”
Worst reported on social media that she’s already had the surgery and is focused on her recovery.
“I hope to end to be at the start of the ’cross season again in September.” -Annemarie Worst
You can watch Worst being lifted to the helicopter in the video that follows Worst’s hospital bed photo below:
We wish her a speedy recovery.
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