Time trial world champion Tony Martin won the final stage time trial at Tirreno-Adriatico.(Image credit: Sirotti)
The Omega Pharma-Quick Step team suffered more bad luck in Monday's opening stage of the Tour of the Basque Country: Dries Devenyns crashed out of the race and was later confirmed to have broken his left arm. The news follows the loss of Tom Boonen for the remainder of the Classics season due to his crash in the Tour of Flanders.
The incident on the Alto de San Miguel in the opening stage of Pais Vasco also took down Devenyn's teammate Tony Martin, but the German continued to the finish. Later tests did not show any fractures to the wrist which Martin previously broke in last year's Tour de France.
"I was there in the first position, but in a moment [Jurgen] Van Den Broeck (Lotto-Belisol) crashed in front of me and I couldn't avoid him," Devenyns said. "I went to the ground, and we were also going at a high speed. Now I have this fracture of my left arm for a third time.
"I am not really lucky with these kind of things in my career. It is really a shame because my condition was good, and I was looking forward to the Ardennes Classics. Now I have to stay calm, as there is nothing I can do. I can only recover as best I can."
Martin finished the stage 28 seconds behind winner Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEdge), after the peloton shattered on run-in to the finish in Elgoibar.
"..The first thing was to get to the final and not to lose too much time, then to see at the hospital if there were any fractures. Fortunately, the results seemed to exclude any fractures. So, it's more important that I am OK, than the fact that I lost time," Martin said.
Martin intends to continue in the race. Devenyns will return to Belgium for further examination and possible surgery to repair his broken radius.
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