Katusha rider Joaquim Rodríguez has been hit with bad luck during the first training camp of 2010 with his new team. On their first ride in Calpe, Spain, Rodríguez hit the pavement and landed on broken glass causing deep gashes.
"In a right hander I could not dodge the broken glass that was on the road and my tubular punctured and I fell on top of the glass. I have to cuts that are pretty ugly. One of them in my buttocks and another on my thigh. They were very shocking, very bloody. The cut was very deep and you could see my gluteal muscles," explained the Catalan rider.
Rodríguez' wounds were so deep and painful he suffered a slight fainting from shock and was rushed to the hospital. "I was taken to hospital where they gave me fifteen stitches in total. They told me I should stay off the bike for at least ten days," he added.
The Catalan rider will leave the scheduled 12-day training camp for his Katusha team today and return to his home in Barcelona to recover. He has set his primary goal of the season to peak for the Ardennes Classics Fleche Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège.
Rodríguez took second in last year's Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and will be joining Amstel Gold Race winner Serguei Ivanov and former Columbia-HTC rider Kim Kirchen at the Russian team to form a dangerous trio. He is also hopeful that his Russian team will secure an invite to the Tour de France, where he is expected to participate for the first time.
Photo: KEC Sport