{"id":667571,"date":"2026-05-13T05:36:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T05:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/667571\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T05:36:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T05:36:08","slug":"australias-top-sprint-hope-kaden-groves-quits-giro-ditalia-due-to-crash-injuries-giro-ditalia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/667571\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia\u2019s top sprint hope Kaden Groves quits Giro d\u2019Italia due to crash injuries | Giro d’Italia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kaden Groves, Australia\u2019s best sprint hope for a stage win at the Giro d\u2019Italia, has been forced to quit on the fourth stage as a result of injuries suffered on day one. He follows another Australian star, Jay Vine, who suffered concussion and a broken elbow<\/a> when crashing on stage two.<\/p>\n

Groves was among several riders injured in a mass crash 600 metres from the line as the race opened in Bulgaria on Friday. The 10-time Grand Tour stage winner was bloodied and limping afterwards, but initially seemed \u201cOK\u201d said his team, Alpecin Premier-Tech.<\/p>\n

The Australian rider is still suffering from the aftermath of his crash during the opening stage of the race and was unable to recover sufficiently to continue the Giro. Groves himself said it was just \u201ca few superficial scrapes all over my body\u201d but it became clear he had shoulder and neck bruising.<\/p>\n

He ducked out of contesting the sprint at the end of Sunday\u2019s stage three and a day off the bike on Monday\u2019s rest day did not ease the pain.<\/p>\n

Ahead of Tuesday\u2019s stage from Catanzaro to Consenza, the first in Italy, he said: \u201cI didn\u2019t ride yesterday. I hope after a complete day off the sensations have improved. I\u2019ll take it day by day and see how things are on the climb. I don\u2019t need to risk anything,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

But not long into the 138-km ride through Calabria, before the daunting 14.5km, near 6% gradient Cozzo Tunno climb, news came through the 27-year-old had withdrawn.<\/p>\n

Adding to the physical pain was the knowledge that the race was set up for the Gympie speedster to overhaul Caleb Ewan\u2019s 11 Grand Tour stage wins and move second alone on the Australian all-time winners\u2019 list, behind Robbie McEwan (24).<\/p>\n

Kaden Groves rides on stage two, a 221km stage from Burgas to Veliko Tarnovo in Bulgaria. Photograph: Tim de Waele\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

In the absence of their big name duo Mathieu van der Poel and Jasper Philipsen, the Belgian team had anointed Groves, who was wearing No 1 in the race, as their main sprinter.<\/p>\n

Now Francesco Busato will be Alpecin\u2019s main sprinter though there may also be openings for 25-year-old Australian Jensen Plowright, who had the team\u2019s backing on stage three when he finished 18th.<\/p>\n

Groves, who won the stage from Potenza to Naples at the Giro last year, had just returned after a break of more than two months with knee trouble following a crash in the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad race at the start of March.<\/p>\n

The peloton still contains two Australian general classification contenders, Red Bull-BORA hansgrohe\u2019s co-leader Jai Hindley and Jayco AlUla\u2019s Ben O\u2019Connor.<\/p>\n

Hindley was irked by Jan Christian when squeezed out at a bonus sprint, but like O\u2019Connor sits handily 10 seconds behind new race leader Giulio Ciccone of Lidl-Trek, along with with pre-race favourite Jonas Vingegaard (Visma Lease-A-Bike).<\/p>\n

Ecuador\u2019s Jhonatan Narvaez won the stage, a welcome lift for Vine\u2019s UAE Team Emirates XRG. Orluis Aular (Movistar) was second and Ciccone third.<\/p>\n

Wednesday\u2019s fifth stage features nearly 4000m of climbing on the 203km route from Praia a Mare to Potenza, a route that could further shake up the standings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kaden Groves, Australia\u2019s best sprint hope for a stage win at the Giro d\u2019Italia, has been forced to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":667572,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-667571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=667571"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667571\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}