« With the world cup final in Livignio, the season gets towards its end. Finally. I’m pretty tired. I’m looking forward to the time to put my feet’s up. But that last important race of the season I wanted to do well, because I knew the form was still there. I took off like at worlds, leading the race with Roel Paulissen for the first quarter of the race. Half way trough, I was still in the group with Sauser, Ravanell and Alvarez for second place. Arriving late to the altitude of Livignio, paid its toll and I started to fall apart, dropping back to 6th place.

Loosing my concentration made me goof up on one of the descents, which caused me to crash. Not really hard, but bad enough to break my much-loved Collé front wheel. That was it for my 2004 world cup season. At least Swiss Susi won his first, long time deserved title, winning the overall title. While Roel Paulissen took home the final race.

Roel invited me to his GP Pommfrit in Belgium the week after. I like to race in Belgium. The Belgium supporters make you feel like a rock star. I was expecting some good end of season racing with a good Belgium beer at the finish. But I did not count on Bart Brentjens, who put the hurt on us right from the beginning. At some point I screamed at him to slow down a bit. He would not listen and shredded us all. Roel had to be happy with a second place only in his own race! While I crossed the line in third, way too tired to have a beer. »