Bumps and bruises for Movistar captain as he loses two minutes to his biggest rivals
Movistar’s Alejandro Valverde was one of the victims of both crashes on the sixth stage of the Tour de France, between Épernay and Metz, as he came down in both incidents. The Spanish rider is competing in his first Tour de France since 2008, but already faces an uphill task after losing 2’09” to many of the other overall contenders.
“At the first crash, the roads were wet, a Rabobank rider fell just ahead of me and the riders coming behind, including me, couldn't avoid him,” Valverde explained. “I got some bruises on the left side, but nothing important.
“At the second crash,” he continued, “we were riding really, really fast, everyone was trying to get to the front and things happened as you could expect from that. People were riding crazy, it seems like everyone is [thinking they were] going to win the Tour. I had almost stopped, but one rider couldn't brake, made me fall and, when I was at the ground, another one hit me hard on my thigh. It was a sharp blow below my hip and that's what hurts me the most, and surely it will do more when my body cools down.”
The first week of the Tour de France is often littered with crashes, as an almost 200-strong peloton of fresh riders competes for the early stages. Last year’s race saw a number of overall contenders crashing out with broken bones, which mercifully has not happened on such a scale this time, but a great many of them lost big time in the incidents today.
Valverde’s loss was minor in comparison to Giro d’Italia winner Ryder Hejsedal (Garmin-Sharp), who finished 13’24” behind stage winner Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Cannondale), but the only rider to make it ahead of the numerous splits was Portuguese Tour de Suisse winner Rui Costa.
“This is the Tour,” Valverde reasoned. “We know there will be a lot of crashes and this time was my turn, but everything is not lost either. More than the two minutes I conceded, which is something I can't do anything about now, I'm most worried about how I will get to sleep tonight and get up tomorrow. We know that there's a mountain stage there and that makes everything more difficult, but I shouldn't have any problems starting, and we will see how everything goes.”
After losing 35 seconds to winner Fabian Cancellara (RadioShack-Nissan) in Saturday’s 6.4km prologue - and therefore 28 seconds to big favourite Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky) - Valverde finds himself in 32nd place, 2’40” down, as the Tour heads for its first appointment in the mountains. He will more than likely make up that deficit on Cancellara, but he must go on the attack if he is to unseat Wiggins, defending champion Cadel Evans (BMC Racing), or the likes of Levi Leiphemier (Omega Pharma-Quick Step), who all finished in the front group today.