"You are going to take a ride around the mountain. They hear you speak Basque and from a car they make you a comb. On the way back they leave the van like this and they grated the van. Thank you for your hospitality."

Former professional cyclist Markel Irizar has posted this message on his Twitter account denouncing the attack suffered by his van this Sunday in the Aragonese Pyrenees. In both photographs the vehicle can be seen with stones on the windshield and with damage to the bodywork.

On social networks, a heated debate on the subject has arisen and the former cyclist has received numerous expressions of solidarity as well as a message that questions what happened.

Irizar thanked the support received and pointed out that "there are rude and disrespectful people everywhere and this is an exception among the wonderful people we have met in the Pyrenees. When the disappointment is over, we will return!"

Although he has not specified where the events have occurred, according to Heraldo.es published this Monday, in some of the comments raised by his message the town of Broto from Huesca is mentioned, at the access door to the Ordesa y Monte National Park Lost, in the Aragonese Pyrenees.

Markel Irizar, 40, a native of Oñate (Guipúzcoa), was a professional cyclist between 2004 and August 2019 and retired after the San Sebastián Classic.

He has been a runner in Euskaltel-Euskadi, Team RadioShack and Trek. Throughout his fifteen years as a professional he played the Tour six times, the Giro five and the Vuelta ten times.

A regular in the Aragonese Pyrenees for years, this year he was going to be honored in the HU-108, a mountain bike test in the Hoya de Huesca, scheduled for May 16 and which was suspended due to the pandemic.

Irizar was to be recognized for his "example of overcoming as he started his career after overcoming testicular cancer".

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