Race director Thierry Gouvenou has rejected the criticism of the routing of the 108th Tour de France.
"It is always easy to say that it is dangerous, but you have to realize that it is becoming more and more difficult to find destinations," Gouvenou told the sports newspaper "L'Equipe", referring to the bad falls on the third stage on Monday .
“For this stage we had to cross Lorient, Lanester, Hennebont and Plouay from the list, which seemed too dangerous to us.
We no longer have a medium-sized city without a traffic island, roundabout or narrowing, ”says Gouvenou.
Ten years ago there were 1,100 dangerous points in the Tour de France.
"This year we're at 2300."
On Monday there had been several falls at the end of the stage.
The Slovenian Primoz Roglic, who was runner-up from last year, also hit the finish line with pain in his tailbone and was more than a minute behind.
The Australian top sprinter Caleb Ewan went down in the final sprint and suffered a broken collarbone.
For him the tour is over.
Previously, the former British winner Geraint Thomas had dislocated his shoulder, but was able to continue after a treatment.
As the Cologne cyclist Nils Politt explained, the riders presented to the race management before the stage and asked for the three-kilometer rule to be applied eight kilometers before the finish. This means that within this range all drivers are rated with the same time, even if they are stopped by a fall. This was rejected by the jury. “You can see the result. It's just criminal. It's a shame to see so many drivers lying on the ground, ”Politt told ZDF.
The Berlin-based Simon Geschke from Team Cofidis shot via Twitter against the UCI, which had issued new security measures, but the wrong ones from Geschke's point of view. The so-called supertuck, in which the rider sits on the top tube of the bike, is prohibited on descents. In addition, the forearms must no longer be placed on the handlebars for a more aerodynamic riding style. It's funny that these positions are banned for “safety reasons”, “while we have target arrivals like this at the same time,” said Geschke.
The former cyclist Jens Voigt also criticized the route of the Tour of France. "You could certainly have avoided one or the other fall if you had chosen the route differently: no descent for the last five kilometers into the destination and wider streets," said the expert from the TV broadcaster Eurosport. The 49-year-old criticized the organizers: "That could have been solved more intelligently and harmoniously."