Giro d'Italia 2020: Bradley Wiggins on Geraint Thomas and how it was 'hard to watch' after crash

Updated 05/10/2020 at 20:22 GMT

Bradley Wiggins says Geraint Thomas would be willing to support an Ineos team-mate, but expects the Welshman to withdraw due to the severity of his injuries. Thomas crashed in the neutral zone at the Giro on Monday and later lost over 11 minutes in the general classification.

The Breakaway: The team talk about Geraint Thomas

Image credit: Eurosport

Bradley Wiggins says it was hard to watch Geraint Thomas during Stage 3 of the Giro d'Italia.

Thomas, a former team-mate of Wiggins for both Team Sky (Ineos) and British Cycling, crashed in the neutral zone ahead of Monday's stage and later lost over 12 minutes as the injuries took their toll.

“The neutral zone, that’s sometimes where the worst crashes happen," Wiggins told Dan Lloyd and Brian Smith on The Breakaway.

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It seems like a bottle came across the road and he was moving up and he rode over it, but the trajectory of the bottle threw his back wheel out. We could see the damage caused to the jersey.

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“What was hard to watch about it is that Geraint has this ability to ride through pain. Most people would be on a flight home after that, but he’s got this ability to ride through suffering when something’s broken or hurt. He can push through that, get to the finish line and then assess the damage.

This is a guy who rode the Tour de France with a broken pelvis. He’s one of the hardest cyclists I know.

"Watching someone put themselves through that, when most of us - or certainly I - would stop… it’s clearly over and the mental side of it drops, but Geraint’s got this ability to push through that and get to the finish.

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"It’s heart-breaking from the point of view that he looked a clear favourite for this race, it’s the strongest version of him that I’ve seen for a few years. We’re not going to get to see him now for the next couple of weeks, and it just shows you how this thing is on a knife edge and can just flip like that."

Thomas has an Ineos colleague still in touch with the general classification leaders, with Tao Geoghegan Hart 03:12 back with plenty of opportunities left in the race to close that gap, but Wiggins believes this could well be the end of G's race.

"Geraint is one of the best team-mates you can have as well, he’s very selfless. He does have a team-mate up there and he’ll do his job if he can. I guess it depends on the physical damage.