Cycling: Crash causes chaos on Tour Down Under

Andre Greipel, front left centre, finishes the race first in a photo finish. Photo / Getty Images

German star Andre Greipel was critical of the course and rival cyclist Alessandro Petacchi after a chaotic end to the Tour Down Under's opening stage.

Three riders, including Greipel's key Lotto-Belisol team-mate Jurgen Roelandts, and a 70-year-old woman were taken to hospital after a crash just under 1km from the finish.

More than 20 riders came down in the crash and one of the riders who veered off to the side of the road collided with the female fan.

She was taken to hospital with minor injuries.

Roelandts was taken to hospital for x-rays on his neck, while Matteo Montaguti (Ag2r) has a suspected fractured collarbone and Frederic Guesdon (FDJ) has a hip injury.

It is the second-straight year a crash has marred the end of the opening Tour stage.

Last year, there was an horrific pileup on the finishing straight at Mannum.

The temperature soared above 40 degrees on Tuesday during the 149km stage from suburban Prospect to Clare, north of Adelaide, and there were also blustery head and cross winds.

The brutal conditions meant the stage finished nearly 40 minutes behind schedule.

But Greipel, who now has nine stage wins in the Tour, was most critical of the slightly-downhill finish.

"Okay, it's a part of our job, nobody tells us that we have to sprint, but the organisation should calculate the risk a little bit for us,'' said Greipel, the overall Santos Tour winner in 2008 and '10.

"We did 75km/h and if there's something that happens you cannot react anymore.'' Race director Mike Turtur said the nature of the finish was made clear to the teams at a pre-race meeting.

"It's dead-straight, straight as an arrow finish - at the technical meeting, everyone was advised it was slightly downhill, so it was going to be fast,'' Turtur said.

"We couldn't have emphasised it more.

"I will speak to Andre to see what his issues are.'' Greipel was also angry at Petacchi's tactics as the pair had a photo finish.

"He went from the left to the right ... I think he didn't care what happened behind him,'' Greipel said.
"Maybe he didn't see me but I think it was just not fair.'' The new Australian GreenEDGE team had another tough day, with Luke Durbridge suffering heat exhaustion.

His race uniform at the finish was caked in salt from his perspiration.

GreenEDGE did plenty of work to help reel in a four-man break that gained more than 11 minutes on the peloton.

The attack, which lasted about 130km, featured rising Australian star Rohan Dennis, a member of the UniSA national team.

The crash meant only a small group of less than 20 riders contested the sprint finish.

But because the accident happened so close to the finish, the first 90 riders were given the same time.

Greipel leads Petacchi overall by four seconds heading into Wednesday's second stage, a 148km race in the Adelaide Hills from Lobethal to Stirling.

- AAP