“It wasn’t an accident” – EF Education-EasyPost calls for action against AG2R driver for Richard Carapaz’s accident

Team DS Juan Manuel Garate told Cyclingnews: “We just want the UCI to apply its rules. There are regulations and they must be respected.” Carapaz was not injured in the crash, but it is always a negative situation for the American team, which is trying to help the Ecuadorian to overall victory at the Vuelta.

In fact, at the end of the day, the French team was fined several thousand Swiss francs for the road closure – something that often happens in grand tours, but it seems that the race organizers wanted to make an example of this stage. Geoffrey Bouchard, Bruno Armirail and Victor Lafay, as well as Cyril Dessel from Team DS, received yellow cards, among others. Heavy fines were imposed. The French team left the day empty-handed, but also with a small lead over Primoz Roglic in the overall standings.

Race director O'Connor himself criticized the decision in a post shared on X. Interestingly, however, he deleted his account about an hour later – most likely due to the backlash, as blocking the road has never been an accepted situation in professional cycling.

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