Cycling: John Degenkolb spoke to Sport Bild about the recent, sometimes serious, falls in the peloton during the road world championships that are currently taking place in Richmond. He does not shy away from criticizing his colleagues, but also holds the organizers and the drivers of the support vehicles responsible.
Unfortunately, it's one of the hottest topics in recent months. Most recently, the Tour de France and the Vuelta had repeatedly seen falls, some of which were serious, with many injured drivers. Of course, teams, organizers and drivers are all looking for clues and are interested in eliminating the reasons for this yesterday rather than today. Most recently, the criticism mainly hit the organizers and the drivers of the support vehicles, especially since they also caused a few falls. In an interview with Sport Bild, John Degenkolb now also takes his colleagues to task and criticizes the sometimes reckless driving behavior in the peloton.
Degenkolb said that "It's also the driver's fault. Many ride regardless of losses and take the highest risk as soon as they sense a chance to win […] Sometimes you think professional cyclists are a bunch of lunatics.” In fact, this is a development that has certainly been observed in recent years - the drivers are fighting with ever harder bandages, at sometimes extremely high speeds and difficult conditions. The 26-year-old also has an opinion on the incidents with the escort vehicles and demands that one must "educate motorcyclists better." Most recently, BMC boss Jim Ochowicz, among others, made a similar statement in an open letter to the UCI.
We hope that the road world championships will come to an end without any serious falls and of course we'll keep our fingers crossed for John Degenkolb.
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