More victims in Giro d'Italia stage three crash

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World champion Mark Cavendish (Sky) and pink jersey Taylor Phinney (BMC Racing) were not the only riders hurt in Monday's crash on stage three of the Giro d'Italia, which was triggered by Roberto Ferrari (Androni Giocattoli-Venezuela). More riders went down in the pile-up and sustained injuries, inluding William Bonnet and Mickaël Delage of FDJ-BigMat. Bonnet suffered contusions on the left side of his body, while Delage hurt his shoulder.

"It's unfortunate as these are the last two riders to lead out [team sprinter] Arnaud Démare," Martial Gayant told L'Equipe. Démare finished fourth on Monday in Horsens, as he was able to avoid Cavendish's crash in front of him by a hair's breadth.

"He told me he almost touched his helmet. Fortunately, Cavendish didn't slide on the road, otherwise Arnaud would have ridden over him."

Other riders were less lucky, as this is exactly what happened only fractions of a second later. Three Farnese Vini-Selle Italia riders came up behind the world champion, and while the first two were also able to avoid the crashed rider, the third one hit him hard and went down himself.

Andrea Guardini, the Italian team's sprinter, swerved around the fallen Sky sprinter on the left hand side. His lead-out man Elia Favilli, at more than 60 km/h, actually jumped over him as if on a mountain bike, as there was no other way to avoid crashing into the Manxman. Pier Paolo De Negri, however, was unable to prevent himself from going down and also suffered significant bruises and a blow to his hip.