Philippe Gilbert abandons the Tour de France



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Philippe Gilbert (Quick-Step Floors) said his Tour de France was finished after his fall at the 16th stage.

The Belgian had trouble getting down the stairs of the medical truck of the race after the stage and had to be helped by the race doctor. He was taken to hospital by ambulance for an MRI.

When asked if his race was over, Gilbert answered simply, "Yes, my turn is over."

Gilbert, part of the day's break A solo gust of wind on the Portet Pass of Aspet and that led to the descent when he baked a corner. He unsheathed his foot to try to slow his speed and make the turn, but he hit a stone wall on the edge of the road and was thrown from his motorcycle in the big ditch by the roadside.

He was finally retired, and, fueled by adrenaline, resumed his bike and finished the stage and even received the award for fighting spirit. He went around the podium but did the shortest of the post-race interviews before going to the bus with his left calf strongly attached.

"It was not so bad, it was not so deep I think at four meters, but there were a lot of stones, and when I stayed there, I thought : "I broke everything", I did not dare move at first, "he said Sporza . "I was waiting, but luckily they were fast, I had a lot of trouble and my knee was badly damaged, but I think I did not break anything, thankfully."

Gilbert was visibly moved when talking to ] Sporza and when he spoke to the media outside the bus of the team at Bagnères-de-Luchon, he then faded in tears before getting on the bus. He was eventually driven by the team's doctor to the medical truck located outside the Tour's press room. He was able to enter on his own but had a visible claudication. The pain had clearly increased during the 20 minutes that he had spent with the doctor, and he needed the help of two people to go down the stairs and walk the short distance to the hospital. # 39; ambulance.

As he was tied up in the ambulance, Race Director Christian Prudhomme came to visit him and talked to him for a while before being taken to the hospital. The image of Gilbert collapsing so heavily on the descent of Portet Pass of Aspet had brought back horrific images of the fatal accident of Fabio Casartelli in 1995. Fortunately, Gilbert managed to get away from his incident, but it seems that his run ends four steps from Paris

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