The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Chris Froome down but not out
BRITAIN’S DEFENDING champion Chris Froome was sent for a precautionary x-ray on his wrist after a crash during the fourth stage of theTour de France yesterday.
The Team Sky rider touched wheels in the peloton and fell just five kilometres into the 163.5km stage.
Marcel Kittel (Giant-Shimano) won the stage from LeTouquet-Paris-Plage to Lille, his third win from four attempts.
After negotiating three British stages unscathed, Froome tumbled shortly after the race got under way on French soil, tearing his shorts, suffering grazes to the left side he hurt in last month’s Criterium du Dauphine and damaging his wrist.
Froome visited the race doctor and required a splint on his wrist to finish the stage and afterwards was sent to hospital for a scan.
Team Sky principal Sir Dave Brailsford said on teamsky.com: “Chris felt fine in the final and felt good physically. We’re going to send him for a precautionary x-ray just to check his wrist.
“We know these things can happen. It’s part and parcel of bike racing.”
Froome’s joints will face a major test on today’s fifth stage, the 155.5km route from Ypres to Arenberg Porte du Hinaut, which features nine cobbled sections totalling more than 15km.
Froome may not have lost time but he dropped back from fifth to seventh in the overall rankings, behind Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar).
Froome finished 42nd on the stage and Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) was 24th to retain the race leader’s yellow jersey.
The Team Sky leader’s wobble could be significantoverthecobbles, wherepunctures are common, as his team support car will be delayed in reaching him.
The forecast wet weather will make the cobbled stage even trickier for the peloton as the Tour commemorates 100 years since the start of the First World War.
Yesterday’s stage was expected to be straightforward but Froome’s crash showed nothing can be taken for granted in theTour.
“Somebody made a mistake,” team-mate Bernie Eisel said. “This wave went through the whole bunch, from position 10 to the last position in the bunch.
“It’s just a big wave and Froomey was like the third rider and with the wave he had no chance. He just went down.”
Another sprint stage was expected in Lille but that did not put off an early two- man breakaway and Thomas Voeckler (Europcar) continued alone when fellow escapee Luis Mate (Cofidis) was swallowed up inside the final 40km.
Voeckler was caught with 17km to go and the sprinters’ teams tried to take control, with Omega Pharma-QuickStep to the fore despite the absence of Mark Cavendish, who today will undergo shoulder surgery.
Giant-Shimano lurked menacingly and took over inside the final 2km.
Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) was first to launch his sprint but, despite appearing more laboured than on the Mall 24 hours earlier, Kittel triumphed once more.
Kristoff was second, with Arnaud Demare (FDJ) third. “It was close today,” Kittel said on ITV4. “The last 30km we rode with really absolute high speed, always 60 (kph) or more. It was really, really fast, difficult to stay together with the team.
“In the end the boys delivered me in front. I was able to sit there on the wheel of (Omega Pharma-QuickStep’s Mark) Renshaw.
“Everything I was thinking about was the last corner. (The team) told me at 250m I could see the finish line and I was almost tempted to go at 500 because I couldn’t see where it was, but I sat down again.
“I went really long. I put in everything I had. It was really, really difficult.”