Van Vleuten out of Giro Rosa, will miss Worlds with broken wrist
Annemiek van Vleuten (Mitchelton-Scott) is out of the Giro Rosa and will miss the UCI Road World Championships after suffering a broken wrist in a crash.
Inside the last kilometer of stage 7 of the Giro Rosa, van Vleuten went down in a crash alongside teammate Amanda Spratt and CCCC-Liv’s Marianne Vos. which she has led since stage 2. Although all three riders remounted and crossed the finish line, van Vleuten and Spratt both went to the hospital immediately after the stage.
Further examination confirmed that van Vleuten had suffered a left wrist fracture, while Spratt was diagnosed with a concussion.
“I was in a good position just going safe to the finish. It was a good day for us, I was never in trouble, we were in control, I was having fun on the bike until the last 500 metres when the girls crashed in front of me and I couldn’t avoid them,” van Vleuten said.
“I felt immediately it was not good with my wrist, because I saw that my wrist was not straight, so I knew straight away that was not good. I will go home now and I will have an operation on my wrist on Saturday.”
Van Vleuten was comfortably in the lead at the Giro Rosa when she went down, with a gap of 1:48 to second-placed Kasia Niewiadoma. In addition to knocking her out of the race, her broken wrist will also keep her from defending her rainbow jersey at Imola Worlds, where she would have started among the very top favorites for the win on a climber-friendly parcours.
“I’m super sad it’s not possible to defend the maglia rosa, but even more, no worlds on a course that suits me,” Van Vleuten said. “I’m disappointed that I cannot defend my world champion’s jersey.”
Spratt is also out of the Giro Rosa. Her status for the World Championships, where she had been expected to be the featured rider for the Australian squad, is not yet clear.
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