Anna van der Breggen was pulled off her bike by Olympic officials

Yet another incident in a series of bad luck for the Dutch team

Photo by: Sirotti

Lily Hansen-Gillis July 27, 2021

In yet another incident involving Dutch cyclists at the Olympics, Anna van der Breggen was allegedly pulled from her bike when officials mistakenly thought she was not allowed to ride the course.

Knocked over

According to the Dutch media outlet Wielerflits, van der Breggen, who came first at the 2016 Olympic road race and third in the time trial, was pre-riding the time trial course at the Fuji International Speedway.

Van der Breggen and teammate Annemiek van Vleuten were preparing for the time trial a day before the event. Despite both riders holding multiple international titles, the Olympic officials mistakenly thought they were not allowed on the course and stopped the riders from continuing.

According to van Vleuten, when the officials stopped them she was able to stay upright but van der Breggen fell over.

According to Japanese cycling coach Kyosuke Takei, a number of riders were stopped.

???????@raykerckhoffs
?… So sorry big problem…#Tokyo2020 pic.twitter.com/zYFpu6Qjic

— ?Kyosuke Takei? (@takeikyosuke) July 27, 2021

Officials apologized profusely for the misunderstanding. None of the riders were injured and the Dutch riders say they have moved on and are focusing on the upcoming race, which takes place Tuesday, July 27 10:30 p.m. EDT/7:30 p.m. PDT.

Dutch luck

This isn’t the first time the Dutch cycling team has experienced strange incidents at the Tokyo Olympics. Yesterday, a Dutch BMX rider rode into an official who had mistakenly walked onto the track.

So this is what happened today. ? Hit an official that wanted to cross the 2nd straight. Hope the official is O.K. My knee is sore, but will do my best to be ready for Thursday! Thanks everyone for the messages, appreciate it! ❤️ pic.twitter.com/QOdJ2r0usT

— Niek Kimmann (@niekkimmann) July 26, 2021

Mathieu van der Poel claims he didn’t know that the ramp on one of the features would be removed during the mountain bike race, and as a result crashed hard and missed out on his podium dreams.

To top it all off, Annemiek van Vleuten says she was not aware there was a rider ahead of her in the road race and crossed the line thinking she had finished first instead of second.