Chris Froome back riding on the road 14 weeks after horror crash

Chris Froome is back riding his bike on the road 14 weeks after he crashed during a recon of the time trial course of the Critérium du Dauphiné.

The four-time Tour de France champion has recently been taking bigger and bigger steps to getting back to full health and form after recovering from multiple fractures and losing four pints of blood in the accident which saw him placed in intensive care for a number of days.

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The 34-year-old posted a photo yesterday from the sun-soaked French Riviera, with Froome living in Monaco with his family, while his British team-mates battled the wet conditions at the Yorkshire World Championships men's road race, captioning it: "Good to be back on the road again".

The next day, his Ineos team-mate Michał Kwiatkowski posted a photo of Froome out on his bike, riding out of the saddle through a tunnel on roads in the southern France.

Kwiatkowksi posted a ride on his Strava the same day the photo was taken, where he rode 59km, although it is unknown how much of this route Froome completed. For an unknown reason, the ride was taken down not long after it had been posted.

Froome recently announced he would be returning before the end of 2019, as he will take part in the Saitama Criterium next month. He will ride the exhibition event alongside his team-mate Egan Bernal, who won the Tour this year, as well as a number of other Tour de France stars.

The Saitama Criterium will mark a big step in Froome's return from injury, as he completes 3.5km circuits through Saitama in Japan on October 27. The event is a spectacle held by Tour de France organiser, ASO, which often sees racing take a back seat to pre-race activities, as riders don costumes and visit unique attractions in Japan.

At the end of August Froome was back on his bike 10 weeks after the crash, completing a couple of track sessions, having been back on his indoor trainer within six weeks of the injury, pedalling with just his good leg.

In the crash, of which Froome's memory is patchy, he suffered a complex, open fracture to his femur while also breaking bones in his sternum and neck as he collided at 60km/h with a wall during a recon of the time trial course at the Critérium du Dauphiné. Froome was using the French stage race as a warm-up for his tilt at a record-equalling fifth Tour de France title, which he was unable to take part in.