Video: Rider thrown across track after arm caught on barrier in high-speed velodrome crash – a year after Dame Laura Kenny and Sir Chris Hoy called on venues to be made safer

A rider was tossed across the track at the UCI Junior Track World Championships on Friday after getting her arm caught on a trackside barrier during a high-speed crash, the incident coming a year after multiple Olympic champions Dame Laura Kenny and Sir Chris Hoy urged  world cycling’s governing body to install screens to help protect riders and spectators at track venues.

While last week’s crash at the velodrome in Cali, Colombia, was not captured by TV cameras in real time, the UCI did post a replay to its livestream, 2 hours 25 minutes and 52 seconds into the coverage in the video below (or you can go straight to the exact point by following this link).

The crash happened on the back straight in the final lap of the opening event of the women’s omnium, the scratch race, covering 20 laps for a distance of 5km.  10 of the 21 riders who began the race failed to finish it, according to the UCI results book, and three of them did not start the next event in the omnium, the tempo race.

https://api.veloresults.com/api/Races/viewPDF/jrWorlds2023/resultsbook

Those three riders were the Mexican Maria Fernanda Villanueva, Malaysia’s Dahlia Hazwani Hasyim, and Chai Roug Lee, representing Chinese Taipei.

Following the race Japan’s Misaki Okamoto was issued with a warning for dangerous riding for moving down towards the inside of the track when an opponent was already there.

No other sanction such as a relegation in the standings was imposed, however, and she went on to clinch the bronze medal, with the victory going to Colombia’s Juliana Londoño  with France’s Clémence Chareau taking silver.

That rider that Okamoto impeded, Portugal’s Patricia Duarte, was catapulted up the track, with the high-speed incident resulting in a number of other riders coming down, including Villanueva who had been riding towards the top of the track.

She avoided the initial incident, but was thrown over her handlebars as one of the other rider’s bikes was thrown up the banking into her path.

Immediately behind her, Hazwami Hashim, wearing number 190, did not actually crash into the Mexican, but a replay shows that she instinctively put her right arm over the barrier just before impact, causing her to get caught on it and be spun around before being hurled across the track.#

All riders appeared to be conscious afterwards and to have made their own way off the track, and while the three mentioned above were forced to abandon, we have seen no reports of any specific injuries.

Last year, Dame Laura Kenny called for velodromes to be made safer following a crash at the Commonwealth Games that saw her England team mate Matt Walls get thrown into the crowd.

Walls was one of three riders, as well as two spectators, one of them a child, who required medical assistance following the incident at London’s Lee Valley VeloPark, which was hosting the track cycling events. The rest of the morning session was cancelled after the crash.

“Maybe there should be screens because Matt should not have been able to go over the top and into the crowd – that’s pretty damn dangerous,” Kenny said.

“It’s the third time now I’ve been in a velodrome and witnessed someone go over the top.

“Matt was laughing and making jokes with the paramedics which is brilliant to hear but if he’d [not gone over] he would have done less damage and certainly done less damage to the little girl.”

Sir Chris Hoy, who was covering the track cycling events at the Commonwealth Games event in his role as a pundit with BBC Sport, said at the time: “There are quite often crashes but they are rarely very serious. This one was the direct result of not having a barrier at the top of the fencing.

> Sir Chris Hoy says safety screens could have prevented Matt Walls’ Commonwealth Games crash

“I think it’s preventable if they put a Perspex screen to protect the crowd. I’ve seen a shot of it and it was horrendous to watch.

“Something has to be done before something genuinely serious happens,” Hoy added.