Affini describes Ayuso’s 80 km/h crash at Paris-Nice

Stage 4 of Paris-Nice was hectic, from echelons in the opening half of the stage, to the mentioned crash mid-way through the stage, which came in almost treacherous conditions as the rain poured down, soaking the roads and leaving standing water.

Edoardo Affini (Visma | Lease a Bike) was sitting behind Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek) when, according to Affini, he thinks Ayuso's back wheel slipped out. "I don't know exactly what happened, but I think he just slipped a bit with the back wheel," said the Italian to Cyclingpro.net.

According to Eurosport Spain, Ayuso escaped without any broken bones, but it could have potentially been worse for Ayuso with Affini close behind.

"He [Ayuso] just crashed in front of me. I'm really happy that I was able to brake just in time to avoid riding into him, that would have been bad for me, but also bad for him. 85kg guys riding into you at 70-80kmph is probably not nice," stated Affini.

Lidl-Trek, at the time of publishing have yet to post any update regarding Ayuso's condition .

Affini finished 19th on the stage after being a key domestique for the echelon chaos, which launched his Visma | Lease a Bike teammate Jonas Vingegaard to the stage win and to take a firm grasp on the yellow jersey of Paris-Nice, which Vingegaard has yet to win so far in his illustrious career so far.

Speaking on the stage, Affini said, "I was able to stay to protect Jonas and make sure that he was in the front, straight from the gun. Unfortunately, we were only with the two of us, so we had to gamble a little bit."