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| Chris Froome being driven away after pulling out of Tour de France. |
This is the 2nd big name to crash out of the tour the France in a matter of days,Mark Cavendish creashing out at the weekend and now Chris Froome the defending champion.
"Froome had resumed the race after his first fall in wet conditions", but withdrew after his second crash with around 66km of the stage still to go.
He was taken away by a Team Sky support car to leave the race.
Geraint Thomas had predicted thats certain cobbled sections would cause problems for the riders.
On tuesday Froome had been cleared to resume training after grazing his left hip and damaging a wrist.He had fallen during the fourth stage of the race on tuesday.However after having an X ray,he was deemed fit to continue with the race.
He was two seconds behind the race leader Vincenzo Nibali..he started the stage in seventh position.
On tuesday Froome had been cleared to resume training after grazing his left hip and damaging a wrist.He had fallen during the fourth stage of the race on tuesday.However after having an X ray,he was deemed fit to continue with the race.
He was two seconds behind the race leader Vincenzo Nibali..he started the stage in seventh position.
Froome's team then tweeted: “Team Sky rider and defending champion Chris Froome out of Tour de France after a crash on the fifth stage.”
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| After falling 2ce in the race,Chris Froome could go no further. |
Ironically, the crashes happened before the racers had reached the cobbled roads which help comprise the Paris-Roubaix classic, the so-called “Hell of the North”, which come around 80km in.
Froome’s hopes had initially been boosted when the organisers removed two of the nine sections of pavé on the stage which would have afforded the British rider’s heavily strapped wrist a little relief. “Due to bad weather and road conditions, two cobbled sectors have been removed from stage five,” a statement on letour.com read.
But even before the cobbles, the day was full of crashes. Sébastien Minard skidded near a roundabout and lost his bike under him. Marcel Kittel did the same round a corner, breaking his cleats. With 70km to go, as the peloton split as it swept around a giant roundabout there were crashes on both sides of the road, including two main race contenders Alejandro Valverde and Tejay van Garderen.
Eventually it was Froome who became the main casualty. And after another crash, before the feared cobbles, he decided enough was enough. Froome's Tour de France was over.
Before the stage had begun, the Team Sky principal Sir Dave Brailsford had announced that Richie Porte would be a protected rider, like Froome, as an insurance policy against Froome pulling out. The decision again highlighted Brailsford’s call to omit Sir Bradley Wiggins, the 2012 winner, from Team Sky’s squad. Wiggins was ninth in Paris-Roubaix in April and won May’s Tour of California but was not selected.
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| Chris Froome about to get into the sky team car that drove him away. |
Froome joins Mark Cavendish in exiting the Tour after the Manxman’s crash on stage one from Leeds to Harrogate. Cavendish had shoulder surgery on Wednesday, which rules him out of the commonwealth games.
Sky’s Geraint Thomas and Simon Yates of Orica-GreenEdge are the remaining Britons.
Additional report from The Gaurdian