It seems that the bad luck of Caleb Ewan has been transmitted from the Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France, as the Australian crashed on stage 13 and finished in penultimate position in Saint-Étienne. Lotto Soudal has not confirmed the extent of Ewan’s injuries, but the rider has said he has knee and shoulder pain.
Ewan was the favorite of the stage, but fell unexpectedly after appearing to have collided with his Lotto Soudal teammates as they led the group around a right corner with just over 70km to the end in their effort to keep the leak going. of the day to a point. manageable distance.
“The guys were doing a really good job: the break was never too far ahead, and then yes, I don’t know what happened. In the corner, they just hit the middle of the corner and then I had nowhere to go. ., so I got on the back of the guy in front of me, “Ewan said of the crash after crossing the 20:05 finish line after stage winner Mads Pedersen (Trek-Segafredo).
Race doctors briefly assessed Ewan’s injuries, which appeared to be abrasions to his right arm, knee and leg, while sitting on the side of the road. He rode his bike again and chased to get back to the race, but without the help of Lotto Soudal’s teammates.
He initially went to the edge of a team car while desperately trying to get back on the field. As the Alpecin-Deceuninck riders increased the pace at the head of the field, race officials prevented Ewan from getting the assistance of the team’s vehicles with 65.5km for the finish.
He finally reached the back of the caravan and tried to find his way between the team cars, but was still 45 seconds from the back of the field.
Eventually, Ewan encountered a small group as the race headed for the key climb of the day, the third-category Côte de Saint-Romain-en-Gal, which was 6.6 km at 4.5%, and where sprinters should dig deep. his chance at a sprint in Saint-Étienne.
However, as the road went up, it marked the end for Ewan, who loosened his pedals leaving nothing in the tank. He got down from the chase group with 50km to go, grimaced in pain but still seemed determined to reach the finish line.
“Once you’re pretty hot, everything feels good, but I think when I get a little cold, I’ll start to feel it, but my knee hurts a lot, my shoulders are really sore. I broke my collarbone last year past, so good, ”Ewan said.
“Yeah, I think once I got down, I didn’t feel so good anymore, and when I got up I did a big chase to get back there, then at the start of the climb, I think they were going pretty hard. So yeah, I really had nothing left. “
In May, Ewan ended his Giro d’Italia 2022, without a win, leaving before stage 12 in what he described as “the Giro of Hell”, but quickly turned his attention to the Tour de France. France.
Ewan has previously won five stages in the Tour de France during the 2019 and 2020 editions, but this year his highest place was 13th in stage 2 and 9th in stage 3 during the Grand Départ in Denmark .
He overcame the difficult alpine stages in hopes of securing a sprint victory in an edition of the Tour de France that he said offers few opportunities for sprinters.
“I think, you know, it’s stage 13, and we’ve only done two sprints, so it’s not a big Tour for sprinters,” Ewan said.
“Today we saw it as an opportunity, and we tried to take advantage of it. But I would say it was bad luck. I definitely don’t think anything has been broken, but you never know until you’ve cooled down, and probably the next “In the morning, to see where all the inconveniences are. I’m fine now, so we’ll see.”