Crashes mar opening day of Tour of Yorkshire

Cycling’s much-anticipated return to Yorkshire proved a brutal one as race favourite Ben Swift and star sprinter Marcel Kittel were among several casualties on the road from Bridlington to Scarborough.

Swift’s Team Sky teammate Lars Petter Nordhaug emerged from the chaos to win the first stage of the inaugural Tour de Yorkshire in front of huge crowds on the Scarborough seafront, but behind him several others were picking up the pieces.

Almost a year on from the county hosting the Grand Depart of the Tour de France, the 174km stage again saw thousands lining the roads but the day’s racing was defined by a huge crash after a brief shower created a slippery descent as the peloton approached Grosmont, high in the North Yorkshire Moors.

There was a warning when Topsport Vlaanderen-Baloise’s Tim Declercq, one of two riders in a breakaway, went straight on at a corner and landed in a hedge before remounting.

But with no race radio, the peloton approached unaware and chaos followed as several riders hit the deck, led by Swift and his team-mate Ian Boswell.

“It was just really slippy,” said Swift’s team-mate Philip Deignan. “It just came on really quickly, the shower, just as we were coming in and it’s a 20% descent so it was probably the worst moment for it to happen.”

As Swift headed off to hospital, his remaining teammates tried to regroup amid the confusion and Deignan and Nordhaug managed to get themselves into a five-man break which got away on the final climb of the day out of Robin Hood’s Bay.

It came down to a sprint on the seafront, with Nordhaug beating Europcar’s Thomas Voeckler and Stephane Rossetto of Cofidis.

Sir Bradley Wiggins elected to stay safe with his attempt at the Hour record scheduled for June. He eventually crossed the line in 96th, almost 15 minutes behind the winners.

Stage winner Lars Petter Nordhaug.