A winner of the Rás in 2011 when he was an An Post-Sean Kelly rider, Gediminas Bagdonas was shouted at after the crash that took down Alberto Contador on stage 7 of the Vuelta yesterday (Photo: Sirotti)
A very popular rider when he raced in Ireland and one of An Post-Chainreaction’s most successful performers during his time there, Gediminas Bagdonas has been blamed for the Alberto Contador’s crash at the Vuelta.
Bagdonas, one of the only two An Post riders to win the Rás in the team’s 10-year history, was up fighting for position near the top of the bunch when the crash occurred yesterday at the end of stage 7.
Rounding a left hand bend well inside the last kilometre, Bagdonas (Ag2r La Mondiale) bumped Tosh Van Der Sande slightly to the right when he made contact with him.
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Momento de la caída de @albertocontador pic.twitter.com/vpDVr6tKjP
— Radioestadio (@Radioestadio) August 26, 2016
The Lotto Soudal rider was bumped into Contador, though the impact was one more robust riders would brush off.
However, it appeared to catch Contador off guard and he lost control and fell off, bringing others with him.
Contador would remount and finish but now must nurse crash injuries through some testing stages.
Clearly not delighted about taking the blame himself, Van Der Sande made clear after the finish that he blamed Bagdonas, shouting at him: “You’re an idiot.”
However, the judges did not agree and the deserved 6th place Bagdonas took stood; an excellent result on what was a tough sprint finish.
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Contador threw his bottle down in anger at the finish, but he has become much more crash prone in recent years in Grand Tours and the sprint yesterday was not seen as problematic by the judges (Photo: Sirotti)
The 30-year-old Lithuania made no sudden or extreme movements during the sprint.
And his brushing off Van Der Sande, and the subsequent contact made with Contador, were very minor in the context of Grand Tour sprinting.
The spill continues a trend of Contador being much more crash prone in Grand Tours in recent years.
He abandoned the Tour de France last month having crashed a number of times. And though he won the Giro last year he crashed and dislocated his shoulder during the race.
He crashed on stage 17 of last year’s Tour and lost time, thus ending his general classification hopes.
He also crashed out of the Tour in 2014, falling victim to a bad spill on stage 10, but went on to win the Vuelta.
Jonas Ven Genechten of IAM Cycling wins the stage, with Bagdonas (far right) taking a fine 6th place that the judges saw no problem with (Photo: Sirotti)
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