Music: {allcanada} Injured Hesjedal Out of Tour de France

Saturday, July 7, 2012

{allcanada} Injured Hesjedal Out of Tour de France

Canadian road cyclist and Giro d'Italia winner Ryder Hesjedal has withdrawn from the 2012 Tour de France after sustaining left leg and hip injuries during a crash on Friday's stage.

Hesjedal was leading the Garmin Sharp team at the tour, and was 18 second back from the overall lead when he was caught up in a crash 26km from the finish of yesterday's stage. Although he managed to finish the stage, Hesjedal dropped back to 108th place overall, 13 minutes behind the leader.

"It's very disappointing to leave the Tour this way," Hesjedal said in a statement. "I was in good form and feeling comfortable, just really settling in to the first week with an eye on the mountains.

"I'll go home, keep working with the medical staff on my recovery, and refocus everything on the Olympics. I will be rooting for them from home and I wish everyone luck for the rest of the Tour."

The 31-year-old Hesjedal was named to the Canadian Olympic Team after becoming the first Canadian to win a Grand Tour event, at this year's Giro d'Italia, in May. Canada only earned one spot in men's road cycling, meaning Hesjedal will have to ride alone at the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Garmin Sharp team doctor Prentice Steffen said "the injury would only be worsened if he tried to ride today."

No word has been given on how quickly Hesjedal is expected to recover.

The crash was disastrous for the Garmin Sharp team. Not only did they loose Hesjedal, who was the lead rider for the Tour de France, but four other riders were injured, with both Tom Danielson and Johan van Summeren ending up in hospital.

Christian Vande Velde and David Millar were also injured in the crash.

"That was scary. Approx 70km/h pile up, like a tidal wave of debris smashing towards us, could do nothing but brake and pray," tweeted Millar.

Garmin sports director Allan Peiper said he had never seen a team struck by so much bad luck during the first week of cycling's showcase event.

"It's definitely a week to forget," he said. "Sometimes it just doesn't work, and this is it for us - we've got so many guys who are injured. We'll have to take stock tonight of who's still capable and who's not.

"It doesn't really matter what happened, they're all on the ground. It's just a difficult moment, we've really just lost our chances for just about everything in this Tour de France."

The Tour de France has been marred by crashes for four consecutive days.

Hesjedal is already on his way home to continue his recovery.

"In car to Paris. Not really the way I envisioned it happening," tweeted Hesjedal.

The Olympic road race takes place in less than one month, on July 28, 2012.