Jens Voigt survives the Pyrénées barely
AXAT, France (VN) – Jens Voigt was among the riders to go down hard on Saturday’s 14th stage of the Tour de France to Plateau de Beille. The Leopard-Trek rider said after the finish that he was banged up, but saw no threat to his continuing the race.
Voigt made the day’s break, crashed twice and then dropped back to help on the final climb. ‘It’s part of the job,’ he said.
“Yeah, I’m ok I guess. I’m far from perfect, but it still should be ok to go to Paris,” he said. “Stuff like that happens sometimes … I guess.”
Voigt crashed twice within minutes on the descent of the Cat. 3 Port de Lers and lost contact with a large chase group minutes ahead of the peloton. The German braked hard entering a left-hand corner partway down the descent of the stage’s penultimate climb.
”My back tire popped on the descent,” said Voigt. “I hit the brakes so hard that it exploded. It’s hard to stay upright when that happens.”
Voigt rode straight through the corner and crashed on the edge of the road. Moments later he went down even harder, on a right-hand bend, and landed in the road, squarely on his elbow, hip and knee. Voigt said his front wheel slipped, but he wasn’t certain what happened in the crash.
“It’s sad, but I’m lucky. I have only scratches and some blood,” he said. “At the Tour, you always have some fantastic days and some days where you hit the asphalt. Today was an asphalt day for me.”
After washing the road grit and dried blood from his legs, Voigt said he had barely made it through the Pyrénées.