Having already crashed out of the Ardennes classics, Daniel Martin's horror season continued when he was forced to abandon the Vuelta a Espana while sitting in third overall.

"Wrong place wrong time once again. Story of this year. Taken down when I'm at my best, this time catapulted into orbit," he tweeted after the stage, before adding. "Came away relatively unscathed. Separated shoulder is nothing compared to others. @krisboeckmans fingers crossed for his recovery."

It was a bad day for Cannondale-Garmin as Alex Howes crashed while he was leading the race solo.

"I just decided to give it a try," he said. "Unfortunately, as you could see, I crashed. I was very slippery and narrow. Of course I'll try again if I have a chance. We're a team of young and motivated riders. We'll try again but it's not as good without Dan."