Like several others, Chris Froome hit the deck on yesterday’s opening stage of the Tour de France, but the Briton did so before the race even started. The Team Sky rider clipped a kerb and went down, cutting his knee.
The scare was fortunately a passing one, with Froome remounting and soon realising that the injuries were not serious.
“I managed to get through the rest of the day unscathed and if that’s the only crash I have this Tour I’ll take that!” he said afterwards, looking on the bright side of things.
Froome knows how dangerous the opening stages can be, with his team-mate Bradley Wiggins crashing out of the 2011 Tour de France due to a fall early on.
Because of that, he and his team regard the Corsican stages as days to try to avoid trouble rather than necessarily gaining time on their rivals.
“I don’t think any of us expected it was going to be plain sailing today, but there were some pretty brutal crashes in the final there,” Froome said, referring to later incidents, including the one which delayed his big rival Alberto Contador (Saxo Tinkoff), as well as the sprinters Andre Greipel (Lotto Belisol), Mark Cavendish (Omega Pharma Quick Step) and Peter Sagan (Cannondale).
“Again it’s just another reminder that this Tour is about so much more than having the form and being here. It’s about staying out of trouble and looking after ourselves in the peloton at the same time.”
Team-mate Geraint Thomas also hit the deck. His crash looked dramatic but fears of a possible fracture proved unfounded and he was able to continue this morning, albeit feeling rough.