Mavi Garcia's ambitions of winning the Tour de France women's avec Zwift overall were dashed when her UAE team ADQ team car hit the Spanish champion's rear wheel in the last few kilometers of stage 4, causing a crash.

Garcia suffered two punctures on the dirt sections and had to change bikes twice. He was leading the lead group with 20km to go when he suffered two punctures and had to change bikes twice.

She crashed at speed, but managed to avoid serious injury by rolling down the road. She suffered road rash on her left shoulder and side, but bravely got up and continued driving.

Garcia continued pacing behind the team cars, but was unable to catch up to the yellow jersey group and slowed to receive treatment from the race doctor.

She finished in 33rd place, 3:11 behind stage winner Marlen Reusser (SD Worx) and 1:31 behind the main group of overall contenders.

Garcia had started stage 4 in 6th place overall, 55 seconds behind. She lost 29 seconds on stage 2, but rallied on stage 3, losing only 6 seconds on the uphill finish.

She is now back in 11th place overall, 2:26 behind race leader Marianne Vos (Jumbo-Visma).

Rubens Bertogliati, sport director of UAE team ADQ, told Cyclingnews that Garcia was not seriously injured and explained why a team car was near Garcia when she joined the chase group.

"She's fine. She's back in the peloton," Bertogliati told Cyclingnews.

"We had to change bikes three times. So when she switched again, everybody was stressed and she was stressed too."

"The problem was that she moved [across the road]. The car was supposed to come back and we were there to give her a bottle to drink after we changed bikes. She didn't notice the car because she wanted to go on the wheels of another rider."

Bertogliati was convinced that the dirt roads of stage 4 made the Tour de France femme dangerous.

"It was dangerous, maybe too dangerous, too difficult for the girls. The gravel road was very hard."