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news
Chris Froome abandons 2014 Tour de FranceChris Froome out of Tour de France
Chris Froome, defending champion in the Tour de France, has abandoned the race. The Team Sky rider crashed heavily yesterday, sustaining injuries including one to his left wrist, and fell twice more today on rain-soaked roads in northern France on today's Stage 5 from Ypres to Arenberg-Porte de Hainaut.
After his second fall, which came as the peloton sped towards the first of seven cobbled sections on today's route, Froome looked in severe pain and was clearly in no position to get back on his bike, instead climbing into the team car, the defence of his title over.
It’s more than a decade since it last rained here on the day of the Queen of the Classics, held in April each year. The forecast for today, however, had been for heavy rain and that’s how it turned out, with organsisers deciding to cut two of the planned nine sectors of pave – neither of them among the more difficult, admittedly – ahead of the start this morning.
Froome’s defence of his title came to an end shortly before the Carrefour de l’Arbre, the first of the remaining seven sections. The 29-year-old had possibly fractured his left wrist yesterday – x-rays taken last evening proved inconclusive – and took to the start this morning with splints on both wrists and handlebars heavily strapped to try and soften the impact of the cobbles.
He never made it that far. Crashing early on as a result of rain-soaked roads, ripping the right-hand side of his bibshorts and losing his race number, 1, denoting his status as defending champion, he came down heavily again with around 60km of the 152.5km stage which crossed some of the key battlefields of World War I.
Following that conflict, when a journalist from l’Auto, the newspaper that organised Paris-Roubaix at the time, headed north from Paris in 1919 to see whether the race could be held again on the battle-ravaged landscape, he described it in one word – “l’Enfer” – thereby giving the race its other nickname, “l’Enfer du Nord” or “the Hell of the North.”
While today’s route had just seven cobbled sections compared to the 27 that feature in the Spring Classic, seldom in recent years has the one-day race lived up to that nickname as much as this afternoon in the Tour de France is turning out to be.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
Latest Comments
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Where does it state in the article that Ashley purchased the stock? it does state that Ashley bought the brand and intellectual property, not the...
- rogerwb 2 hours 40 min ago
Jump off the bike and run across. I cycle in trainers though.
- momove 3 hours 43 min ago
Cheers for the lesson! Wasn't expecting one so was pleasantly surprised, especially getting to find the origin of "laconic"!
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Isn't it a rights issue?
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Same here - it took me by surprise. 10:30am doesn't feel like a dangerous time to cycle; apparently I'm wrong on that.
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If anything, it looks a bit like an SL6
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Other commenters have different views True!
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Incredibly bone-headed.
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Lidl have a window poster emblazoned, "Black Friday. Starts Sunday".
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81 comments
No-one has a Grand Tour sewn up in the first week.
Personally I think it's very well balanced now. Contador's capable of making time on Nibali in the mountains and in the ITT, but how much remains to be seen. Plus the fact that contador and froome won't be marking each other over everything bigger than a road bridge will make for much more interesting racing. Contador *has* to attack now, two and a half minutes is a lot of time. Plus Talansky, Valverde and VDB are still right in the mix. two flat stages for everyone to have a breather and then three in the Vosges that'll be a real test of who's brought their A game. Can't wait.
I was really looking forward to the battle between Contador and Froome.
I don't think Brailsford looked upset that he hadn't bought Wiggins. Sometimes there's more to it than just the riding. Team work and team spirit count for a lot.
I think you have to say that a lot of the Tour teams missed a step with today's stage. It really did throw up Classics weather, but a lot of the riders looked uncomfortable riding it. That may have been the case without the rain in any respect. With or without Froome's fall you have to say that Froome would have struggled as much as Contador, and I think there was a tacit recognition of that given he got off the bike.
Good luck to him though. I hope he can build for the Vuelta. You sort of feel that Nibali has this sewn up already now. He looks composed, confident and relaxed. Very impressed with him so far.
If only Geraint Thomas was a bit more explosive in the mountains. He put in an awesome ride bringing Porte home.
Never got on with the smugness of SKY, but I have to say that Froome looked a broken man when he was getting in the car.
Hopefully Nibali has found his form and Contador will have to fight for his win.
Look forward to seeing Froome at La Vuelta.
no-one will be as gutted as Wiggins,
to deny someone the opportunity to race as they are in a small window of optimum fitness and mental state, on the off chance that the other fella on form the same time who had also peaked.....would not fall off/get a bug/bomb in a time trial seemed too ridiculous for words
its the tour for god sake....anything can happen in 3 weeks, and counting their chickens has spunked away the chance of a lifetime for someone else......they should have both raced
sorry for froome
sorry for wiggo
brailsford you are a plumb!!!
It's harsh to blame Brailsford though. I expect he would have liked to have a reserve GC contender up his sleeve for the very reasons you state. However Wiggo and Froome have pretty well demonstrated that they can't work together. They may smile and say otherwise but there is bad blood. Brailsford could really sensibly only pick one of them and have a functioning team and he picked the reigning TDF champ.
Maybe Froome should just get his dad to teach him how to ride a bike.
I was supporting Nibbles from the start but it will be disappointing if he doesn't get some stiff competition.
Froome didn't even make the cobbles.
Porte should be good for podium, I've felt Niballi was favourite for the overall for a while. Froome just hasn't looked convincing all season. Pressure/nerves or just a poor streak. Doesn't really matter now.
Plans of mice and men etc. If it were that easy to predict winners then there would be no bookmakers. Certainly Froome was unfortunate yesterday but today....it seemed inevitable to me that he would go down again, given the weather, parcours and his injuries. Tough for him to swallow but crashing is part of racing. Maybe he'll fancy a crack at La Vuelta...
jimmy ray will - your right about Wiggins and his 3rd places at the Vuelta and the Tour but that was a few years ago and i just dont think he has it in him now to be a genuine GC contender, a bit like Evans.
I still love him to bits, he's been brilliant for British Cycling and on his day the best TT'er in the world, but the one week tours and, as shown earlier this year, the one day classics are where he should concentrate on in my honest opinion.
Oh well. Not being a particular Froome fan and disappointed that Sky couldn't deliver 2 ex winners to this British Grand Depart, I wanted Nibbles to win this year. Looks promising... although with Froome out I might be switching support to Porte.
The arguments above are interesting, apparently Bradley only won because Froome towed him round, but Froome having the support of Porte is completely different? Apparently Porte is good enough to podium too? It follows that if we had Wiggo with Porte in support in the mountains Sky would still be formidable, but we don't. Richie is all* Sky have got now...
Speaking of all round bike racers, it was worth going to watch just for Jens on day one
and on the TV I loved watching Sagan working through the bunch yesterday nippy slick stuff. Le Tour is big enough to manage with a few retirements.
*no disrespect. We'll see what he or G can do.
Stop talking about Wiggins and start talking about Nibali. He's the only GC contender who regularly races the spring classics. He's bust his arse learning to race on cold wet cobbles with the hard men in Belgium every spring while Froome and the other GC riders are wanking into their power meters in Tenerife.
This is the result and it's not bad luck or good luck. It's proper old fashioned bike racing. Those who have focused on being athletes first and bike riders second have been cruelly exposed.
I don't recall Nibali ever racing any cobbled classics.
He's done Amstel Gold and Fleche Wallone but never has he ridden Flanders or PR. He normally does Trentino and LBL with the odd MSR.
Proof! A double barrel shotgun is better than a single one.
Christ, I can't believe people are pulling out 'I told you so'. Last year Wiggins wasn't the plan B, Sky did fine, this year Wiggins isn't the plan B and Sky aren't doing fine. They'd have been building their team around assumption of failure, with a rider who climbs alright but no where near the level of the other GC contenders. They'll put Porte up for GC and he's ahead of Contador and can climb reasonably well.
And given the sheer number of riders who went down, who's to say that any plan B rider wouldn't have avoided the same fate? It was a day for the A+ level bike handlers.
I was in general agreement with everything you said until this...
'no where near' is inaccurate and inflammatory in my opinion. A 'more limited' climber is a more accurate description... Wiggins is one of the very best climbers in the world and with regards to TT/climbing ratio, 3rd only to Froome and Contador.
That's fair, he's a very good climber (much better than alright so I'll hold my hands up to that), but he's not looked amazing on climbs this last year, he was solid at the Tour of Cali but Contador dropped him by quite a margin at one stage. If there was more than one ITT I think Wiggins would have been a good choice because we know he can put the pain into the other GC guys.
Given Wiggins' struggle in the Giro in 2013 and Froome all over the place today, do you think that Sky include bike handling as part of their 'marginal gains' drive?
Don't forget Thomas - he'll be falling as soon as things head down hill!
Right, time for Froome to get on with preparation for the Vuelta a Espana!
A straight punch up between him and Quintana?
Yes please!
The British summer of sporting misery gets worse
2 years ago we were full of ourselves; even coming up with reasons why the Aussies were so bad at sport. Oh well, 'it's only a game'. Take note Brazil, you'll get over it 
Well, well, well
It was debated and debated on the internet....
and in the end, the internet armchair experts called it right.
Sky would have been OK if they had won... but now - we have to look at who they left on the bench and ask questions.
Of course - on the flip side, Wiggo rarely goes well in the wet either - and I suspect the decision to leave him at home was only partly to do with Froome, but more to do with the form of Contador (as in, Wiggo was not the right 'plan B')
I've seen people repeating this on various social media platforms as truth and fact, as though Wiggins is actually part Mogwai who mustn't be allowed to get wet or something.
I'd bet my left bollock to London that if you can become a National Champion in the wet, you must be doing something pretty damn well.
The grumbling suspicions were that Froome drove the decision to bin Wiggins off this years tour, what comes after pride again?
The team should have been built for Froome to fight for GC, but Wiggins should have been in for days like today, as mentioned above a lot of other GC contenders looked far more comfortable, Froome was always going to be jittery, hence he needed extra protection.
I know some are going to think that it's easy to be wise after the event but I've been saying exactly this for ages and I'm not alone. The overwhelming response has always been "Well, Brailsford knows what he is doing", and I am not going to dispute that, but he's still human, he can make mistakes and I always thought this was glaring mistake. Was I right? Possibly, but I'm not as naive as to not fully understand that even a broken clock is right twice a day.
In my view, bringing Wiggins would have been a better plan B than Porte and it would have been better PR for the team. I honestly can't see Porte getting on or anywhere near the podium, not that I am suggesting Wiggins would be guaranteed a 'step'.
I make you right there. However today's stage is really shaking things up, with Porte putting big time into Contador at the moment!! Can't wait to see this stage. If Porte podiums in Paris, big questions will be asked of Sky!
cant believe people are having a pop at Froome. Wiggins this, wiggins that....Froome fell twice before the cobbles so what difference would it make having a cobbles man in the team - none and Wiggins is not in the same class as Froome, Nibali, Contador etc etc.
I hope he makes a full recovery and kicks everyones arse in the Vuelta.
Well said.
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