De Fauw an 'emotional wreck'

By Brecht Decaluwé

Belgian Dimitri De Fauw is still coming to terms with the death of Issac Gálvez after being involved in the crash which killed the Spaniard on the fifth night of the Gent Six Day. "Emotionally I'm a wreck. I need to move on," De Fauw told Belgian newspaper De Standaard. Although the rider from Gent admits that the accident is still weighing heavily on his mind.

"On Sunday morning I returned to the Kuipke track to talk with Patrick Sercu, the organiser, and my minder Robert D’Hont. They looked after me and told me it wasn't my fault. The prosecutor did the same, allowing me to tell my version of the story. You're innocent. But still, in your head you're imagining things that aren't there. How am I supposed to digest this?" De Fauw said.

The 25 year-old discovered the terrible news while being checked over at the Gent University Clinic hospital. "I heard two doctors talking about the accident and the death. They didn't know I also arrived from the track and crashed together with him. My heartbeat rose immediately."

Recalling the events of Saturday night’s second Madison, De Fauw explained, "I was sitting in fourth or fifth position in the bunch. Iljo Keisse had just accelerated. We came out of the corner towards the finish when the bunch made a sweeper. I didn't see anything, I didn't hear anything, but suddenly Galvez was there; he had accelerated behind me to start the chase on Iljo. I never saw him coming. We hooked into each other with our handlebars and got catapulted towards the top of the track. It all happened in a fraction of a second."

De Fauw described his injuries as "only scrapes" but admitted that the real wounds were much deeper: "It was supposed to become a party. Winning or at least the podium for Iljo, the track record for me, everyday 7,000 people going out of their minds. Until suddenly, bang. And everything fades to black."