Swiss cyclist Gino Mäder dies after Tour de Suisse crash
Swiss cyclist Gino Mäder, 26, has died in hospital after crashing at the end of stage five of the Tour de Suisse race, his team said on Friday.
Despite the efforts of medics at the Chur hospital where he was taken on Thursday after being resuscitated, Mäder “was unable to rise to his last and greatest challenge and at 11.30am we had to say goodbye to one of the lights of our team”, his teammates wrote in a statement.
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Gino, thank you for the light, the joy, and the laughs you brought us all, we will miss you as a rider and as a person.
— Team Bahrain Victorious (@BHRVictorious) June 16, 2023External link
Today and every day, we ride for you, Gino.
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Mäder went off the road on the descent towards the finish line and fell into a ravine. Medical staff who reached Mäder found him motionless in the water. They performed CPR before he was airlifted to hospital.
The crash occurred while descending the Albula Pass in Graubünden, southeast Switzerland. American Magnus Sheffield, who also crashed at the same spot, was responsive and was taken to the hospital with bruises and a concussion.
The public prosecutor’s office and the Graubünden cantonal police are now investigating. They are looking for witnesses who may have seen or even filmed the accident.
Tweeting on Thursday after the crash, world champion Remco Evenepoel of Belgium questioned the decision to finish the race on that descent. “While a summit finish would have been perfectly possible, it wasn’t a good decision to let us finish down this dangerous descent,” he wrote. “As riders, we should also think about the risks we take going down a mountain.”
Some riders were going over 100 km per hour, according to television images, on this fast downhill road approaching the end of the mountainous fifth stage into La Punt.
Today’s stage replaced by ride in homage
The 6th stage of the Tour de Suisse between Chur and Oberwil-Lieli has been “neutralized”, following Mäder’s death, the Tour organisers said on Friday.
Instead, the peloton will ride the last 30 km forming a cortege in homage to their tragically departed colleague.
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