Chris Froome Crashed and Had to Run but it Could Have Been Worse

Part of the charm of the Tour has always been the fans lining the course cheering and running beside the riders. But things have officially gotten out of hand.

Race leader Chris Froome and several other riders were involved in a crazy crash on Thursday that centered around a scooter and overzealous fans. Froome’s bike was so badly damaged that he actually had to continue the stage on foot until his team could race to get him a replacement. He was less than a kilometer from the finish line when it happened.

This all happened during the 2016 Tour’s climb up the fabled Mont Ventoux, which is home to one of the most grueling climbs in cycling. That’s not a great spot to lose your bike and need to run. Take a look at how it all went down:

Froome managed to finish the stage and increase his lead to 47 seconds over fellow Brit Adam Yates, but he’s lucky it wasn’t a complete disaster.

This was all caused by fans crowding the route which has increasingly become a problem at the Tour de France. As you can see below, things have gotten pretty ridiculous. Not only is it annoying for the riders, but it’s also dangerous. At this rate someone is going to either die or be seriously injured by a collision on the course. In fact, I’m shocked it hasn’t happened already.

Race organizers have to do something about this. I realize fans along the course are a huge part of the event, but on the mountain stages there is nothing holding them back from interacting directly with riders. When that happens this is the result. The Tour must institute barriers on the side of the road of all stages to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

If Froome had been seriously injured by his fall and forced to abandon the race, how outraged would everyone have been? A few inches either way and that could have happened and this would be a much bigger story.