Irish U23 international Matthew Devins is back on track after a short recovery period following a very mixed couple of days at Le Tour de Bretagne Cycliste (2.2) in France last week.
The 19-year-old, now in his second season with Andrew McQuaid’s Trinity Racing, found himself in the combined classification leader’s jersey after stage 1; a surprise bonus that he was delighted with.
However, that very positive development was short-lived when he crashed hard in unusual circumstances on the second stage. He told stickybottle he was riding along one moment, and the next he was on the ground having come down, over the handlebars and onto his head.
He’s still not quite sure what happened, though suspects something went into his front wheel catapulting him off the bike. The medics immediately intervened and put Devins into the back of an ambulance. Continuing in the race was not presented as an option, such was the heavy impact of the fall.
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“We were doing about 60k an hour and I was going in a straight line; I didn’t hit a bump and nobody touched wheels or anything. But I just got absolutely scattered. The lads reckoned either something went into my wheel or my hand slipped of the bars.
“It was a freak crash; straight over the bars and crack down on to my head. I split the helmet and had plenty of road rash down the right side. Then the medics saw me trying to get up they just said ‘no’.
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“They sat me back down and then I was off in the ambulance. It all happened so quickly. But thankfully it turns out there was nothing really wrong with me, the CT scans were all clear. It shouldn’t set me back to much.”
Devins said on stage 1 he and his Trinity Racing team were working for their sprinter, and Australian U23 champion, Blake Quick. When a four-man breakaway went clear Devins was sent to the front – along with riders from the Team DSM and Groupama FDJ development squads.
While they controlled the gap well and it looked like the move would be caught, several crashes in the bunch in the final slowed its progress. That ensured the riders up the road just about held on to the finish. Mickaël Guichard of WB-Fybolia Morbihan claimed the victory just seven seconds ahead of the main bunch.
Devins picked up climbers’ and sprinters’ points along the way. And with the two surviving breakaway riders wearing the yellow and green jerseys the following day, the combined classification jersey passed to the Irishman.
“It was pretty good,” Devins said of taking his first classification jersey at this level. “It was a solid day out and the team was pretty pleased with our efforts. A crash in the last kilometre messed up our sprint effort but it was a promising start to the rest of the week.
“Morale was really high and after the team had worked so well together on the first stage, we were all really motivated for the next day,” said Devins.
For now, he added his team was going to monitor him for a short period and assess his condition before he races again. However, he was hopeful he would be back in action very shortly as he felt he was ready.
