Kevin Geniets has been forced to abandon Paris-Nice after an accident involving an advertisement board before the start of stage seven.
The Luxembourg road race champion, who rides for Groupama-FDJ, was passing through the media mixed zone in Nice ahead of the penultimate stage seven, when a gust of wind blew the advertisement boards used by television broadcasters over and onto the rider.
Geniets fell to the floor as bystanders rushed to help, Danish TV cameras capturing the incident as the board was pulled off him, the 25-year-old remaining sat on the floor clutching his leg and grimacing in pain after the incident.
After having his ankle treated by the medical team, Geniets started the stage but abandoned soon after. He now joins a growing list of abandons at the stage race, with only 110 riders left competing at the time of writing.
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Before the start of stage seven, five riders failed to take the start while Michael Storer (DSM) and Mike Teunissen (Jumbo-Visma) also abandoned in the opening kilometres.
A bout of flu is apparently making its way through the pelotons of the concurrently running Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico, decimating squads in France in particular.
Alpecin-Fenix, Astana, Cofidis and EF Education EasyPost are all down to three riders at Paris-Nice, while Israel - Premier Tech have only Hugo Houle remaining in the race.
For the final two stages, Paris-Nice sets off from the city of Nice for stage seven before a summit finish on the Col de Turini, while the final stage eight provides another climbing day starting and finishing once again in Nice.
Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) currently leads the race, holding a 39 second lead over BikeExchange-Jayco's Brit Simon Yates, while TotalEnergies' Pierre Latour sits third, a further two seconds adrift in the general classification.
