Vos undergoes surgery for collarbone fracture

Image 1 of 5

European champion Marianne Vos (Waowdeals) will miss a month of racing after crashing in Liège-Bastogne-Liège on Sunday and fracturing her collarbone. The Dutch rider had successful surgery to repair the break and will be confined to indoor training for the coming weeks.

"I won't be racing during the next four weeks, which means I will have to miss the GP Elsy Jacobs, Trofee Maarten Wijnants and the Wielerfestival Aalburg," the Waowdeals leader said.

"The altitude training which I had planned during the second half of May doesn't seem to be jeopardised. It is expected that I can pick up where I left off somewhere in June. It's disappointing that things don't go as planned – I was nicely easing into the pace – but fortunately, the season is still long."

Vos described the incident, which happened in the crux of the race with just over 20km to go.

"It was going hard in the run-up to the next climb, the Roche-Aux-Faucons as everyone wanted to be well positioned," Vos said.

"There was a crash on the left-side of the road in a short descent. I was on the other side and saw Jeanne (Korevaar) take a tumble in a soft turn to the right. The group was startled which made me crash and roll-over, landing on my right-hand side."

Vos got a spare bike from the team car, finishing the race in 56th place, 6:24 behind winner Anna van der Breggen (Boels Dolmans), but knew something was wrong as she had difficulty pulling on the handlebars.

"After the race, I had a check-up in the team bus, after which I went to the hospital in Maastricht for a scan where the fracture was confirmed. I then had surgery at a specialist in Amersfoort.

"The procedure went very well – it's nice that people wanted to help so quickly. I have to take it easy for a couple of days. Depending on the pain, I can then cautiously start training on the Tacx."