There were chaotic and alarming scenes at the Vuelta a Colombia on Sunday, as the stage winner crashed into his wife beyond the finish line amid a deluge in Montería.
Luis Carlos Chía, wearing the yellow jersey as overall leader after winning the opening stage, triumphed again on stage 3 in a last-gasp win in the pouring rain.
However, his celebrations were short-lived as television cameras cut to him lying on the ground having collided with someone beyond the finish line. That person turned out to be his wife, Claudia Roncancio, who is also a rider as well as a photographer.
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Chía limped to the podium ceremony, nursing his right leg. Roncancio, meanwhile, was taken to hospital and required four stitches, according to Colombian newspaper El Tiempo.
Following the podium ceremony, Chía told the Caracol broadcaster that his brakes didn't work properly in the wet conditions, which were so extreme that he had been sprinting through surface water.
"That's the area for photographers. It could have been her or anyone else. I was coming at high speed. The other day it was the same but that day it hadn't rained and my brakes worked perfectly," he said.
"Today I wanted to brake and the brakes blocked up, and I went straight into her."
Roncancio was said to be relatively unhurt, and Chía was able to share a joke about the situation. He described his pair of stage wins as "a dream come true" and is set to start stage 4 in the leader's jersey.
The moment of impact was not fully captured by television cameras but you can watch how the bizarre events unfolded in the videos below.
