By Susan Westemeyer
A traffic island proved to be the downfall of Gerolsteiner riders David Kopp and Marcus Zberg only a few hundred metres before the finish of the second stage of the Tour de Suisse. The two were preparing for the bunch sprint finish when they went down. Both eventually crossed the finish line on their bikes.
"The results of this stage were of secondary importance to us," said Directeur Sportif Reimund Dietzen. "The important thing is that David and Markus are OK."
"It doesn't look as if anything was broken," he said. Monday morning, team spokesman Mathias Wieland told Cyclingnews "the two are doing relatively good with 'just' bruises, scraps and so on. They will both start today. Of course we have to wait and see how they cope with their injuries under race conditions."
Teammate Johannes Frohlinger witnessed the crash. "Especially Markus, who had a bad crash three weeks ago in Catalunya, didn't look good. I stayed by him and shoved him a little the last few metres."
