American still upbeat despite hitting the tarmac in for the third time in three road stages
BMC Racing’s Taylor Phinney hit the tarmac for the third time today, inside the final 40km of the 209km stage between Modena and Fano, meaning that the 21-year-old American has crashed in each of the three road stages so far. The incident occurred as Saxo Bank’s Lucas Sebastian Haedo rode into the back of a Colnago-CSF Inox rider in a moment of inattention; both came down, and the resulting ripple through the peloton saw a number of others crash, including Phinney.
This year’s Giro has been relatively light on crashes, with the all 198 members of the peloton still riding after five nervous stages but, in those that have come, an almost ever-present feature has been Phinney; through no fault of his own.
While he was unhurt, the latest incident could hardly have come at a worse time. The peloton was just picking up speed on the approach the the only classified climb of the stage in Gabbice Monte. By the time Phinney was up and riding again, he faced a long, hard chase to the peloton, which he ultimately gave up on.
“I made it through an entire Classics season with no crashes – nothing in the beginning of the year – and then I come here and it seems like it’s every day,” said Phinney. “A lot of it has been out of my control. The only thing I can control is my attitude towards it and I’ve accepted that’s way the sport is. And that’s the way life is – you have highs and lows. You kind of ride the roller coaster and see where it takes you.”
The second of Phinney’s crashes was undoubtedly the most costly, as his resultant ankle injury prevented him from playing a full part in yesterday’s team time trial; costing him his overall lead in the race. He was still within touching distance of the maglia rosa however, but – having given up his pursuit of the peloton today – he lost 12’02” by the finish and will not see pink again this year.
The optimistic American is philosophical about his losses however, and will look for further opportunities in the race.
“I lost a bunch of time but I’m not here to do the general classification,” he said. “I have to be lucky that I’m able to continue on and look forward to the next couple days.”
In addition to Phinney, BMC Racing teammates Mathias Frank and Mauro Santambrogio also came down in a strange incident at the top of the climb. Nobody was hurt however, and assistant directeur sportif Max Sciandri sees things through his experienced eyes.
“When you crash, it’s bad,” he said. “But if you don’t break anything, it’s good. We’ll continue to keep our fingers crossed.”