In a chaotic end to what had been a relatively calm day for the most part, there were a string of nasty crashed in the finale of stage 3 at the 2025 Tour de France on Monday afternoon. Among those to go down in the incidents was Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe‘s Jordi Meeus, and speaking at the finish line, team DS Rolf Aldag gave his thoughts to CyclingUpToDate and the other assembled media.
“First of all, I want to send our thoughts to everyone affected by what happened. It’s a difficult situation, and unfortunately, we’re not able to do much in the moment. But we’ll see how things develop,” Aldag began. “It’s good we had immediate input and support from our medical team — hopefully, that makes a difference. I don’t have all the details yet, but if it looks serious, we’ll have to evaluate it carefully.”
Thankfully, due to the brilliance of modern race radios, information was quickly relayed to the team car and the medics that a rider was down, ensuring almost instant support at the scene of the crash. “We see it live on TV, with the race coverage. Then we’re communicating by radio with each other. If a rider goes down, the team doctor is informed and sent to the scene immediately,” Aldag details. “He’s called, he finds the rider, and starts treatment straight away.”
Still though, given the seriousness of the crash, Meeus will need to evaluated seriously before a decision of his Tour de France future is made. “As I said, the first thing is medical evaluation — getting a clear diagnosis. Then it depends on how the rider feels,” Aldag explains. “If there are bruises, sometimes they can continue. But if there’s a concussion, absolutely not — with the brain, you don’t take chances. Everything else depends on the rider’s condition and subjective feeling. Even something like a deep flesh wound can cause shock, and that also requires careful assessment.”