Following medical assessment after his crash yesterday, Dave Zabriskie has learned that he sustained a fracture in his fall and will miss an important objective as a result.
“He suffered a broken left clavicle in the recon crash,” a Garmin-Sharp team spokesperson told VeloNation. “He will most likely have surgery next week, on Tuesday.”
Zabriskie was riding the course prior to the time trial stage of the Tour of California and fell heavily. That accident has put him out of competition for the immediate future.
“As a result he won't be able to race US National Championships and he'll need to recover from surgery before we can speculate on next races,” the spokesperson continued. “It’s a bit early for that at this point.”
The US national championships for professional riders will be held next week in Chattanooga, Tennessee, with the road race and time trials taking place between May 25th and 27th.
Zabriskie is a six-time winner of the USPRO time trial, with two of those victories coming in 2011 and 2012. He will consequently miss out on the chance to take a hat trick of consecutive titles.
His collarbone fracture will put him out of competition for several weeks, raising a question mark about whether he will be able to ride this year’s Tour de France. That decision will likely be made in the coming days, with the outcome of his surgery giving he and his team a better position to estimate when he could return.
Meanwhile the 2008 world time trial champion and past American national TT holder Amber Neben will also miss next week’s championships after she crashed during the women’s time trial at the Tour of California.
The one-stage event was run off prior to the men’s race against the clock, and Neben hit the deck heavily after riding with speed into a tricky corner.
The crash looked severe and medical assessment confirmed a serious injury. According to her squad Team Pasta Zara, the 38 year old has sustained a fractured hip. It has not yet clear how long she will be out of action.