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Spanish mountain biker seriously injured after being accidentally shot by hunters

The 35-year-old cyclist was riding through an area where an authorised hunt was taking place when he was shot

A mountain biker was seriously injured in Catalonia over the weekend after a hunter accidentally shot him with a rifle.

The 35-year-old cyclist was riding through a forested area near the town of Cabrils, about 30 kilometres north-east of Barcelona. Local police confirmed that an authorised hunt was taking place in the area at the time of the incident on Saturday.

According to officials, the cyclist was “gravely injured” and airlifted to Vall d'Hebron hospital near Barcelona.

A police investigation into the incident has been opened. No further details are available at this time.

> Cyclist shot by hunter who says he mistook him for a rabbit

While rare, we have reported on several cases over the years in which bike riders have been shot by hunters.

In November 2021 a cyclist in Spain, this time in the province of Alicante, had to be treated in hospital to have shotgun pellets removed after being shot by a hunter who had mistaken him for a rabbit.

In 2018 a British mountain biker living in the French Alps was unfortunately killed by a 22-year-old taking part in a shoot organised by a local hunting club.

Former Austrian national time trial champion Christiane Koschier was shot in 2014 while preparing for a time trial near Vicenza, Italy.

> Cyclist shot while warming up for time trial - hunter said he was aiming at a hare

Koschier, who spent the night in hospital but luckily suffered no long-term effects from the incident, joked afterwards that her rivals “can only stop me by shooting me.”

Main image licensed under CC BY SA 2.0 by Paul Wordingham on Flickr

Ryan joined road.cc as a news writer in December 2021. He has written about cycling and some ball-centric sports for various websites, newspapers, magazines and radio. Before returning to writing about cycling full-time, he completed a PhD in History and published a book and numerous academic articles on religion and politics in Victorian Britain and Ireland (though he remained committed to boring his university colleagues and students with endless cycling trivia). He can be found riding his bike very slowly through the Dromara Hills of Co. Down.

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