Alberto Contador (Astana), who finished fifth in the tough fourth stage of the Vuelta a Burgos, was unlucky enough to crash after the stage, when he was riding back down to the team bus. Contador fell approximately 6 kilometres from the finish line in Lagos de Neila, and was quickly attended to by team director Marino Lejarreta and doctor Sergio Quilez.
Contador briefly lost consciousness, and was taken to the General Yagüe hospital in Burgos, where a CAT scan was performed on him to determine the exact reason of his crash. Contador suffered a similar accident in 2004 when he fell during the first stage of the Vuelta a Asturias, and should have abandoned. At that time, nobody realised that Contador had a blood clot in his brain, but when he collapsed at home a few days later, he needed surgery to recover. He was able to successfully come back to win a stage of the Jacob's Creek Tour Down Under in Australia in 2005.
