A 15-year-old girl was among those injured in a mass cycle crash near Christchurch yesterday.
The crash happened at 7pm in a bunch-finish of the weekly road race of the Leeston Cycle Club.
Club president Albert Anderson said the crash happened in the seniors' race but there were high school students in the race, including the 15-year-old girl.
"A few went over the handlebars," said Anderson, adding that none of the students was seriously injured. "They were in A&E 'til 1am."
A broken collarbone was the most serious injury that he was aware of.
The Canterbury District Health Board said staff saw seven injured riders, and three were admitted to hospital.
Anderson was about 100m behind the crash. It wasn't clear what caused it, but he said no motor vehicles were involved.
He said that of the 40 or so riders in the race, about 30 were in the bunch and he understood nine were attended to by St John ambulance staff.
Two riders were flown to hospital by rescue helicopter.
"There's a lot of grazed people and gravel rash."
Spectator Shane Epiha, who looks after the club's juniors aged 11 to 14, was standing 200-300m from the crash.
"I'm not sure exactly what happened; there's been a touch of wheels or something along those lines and then just everyone went down - it was terrible to see."
"One of the junior's dads is involved and he had a broken collarbone, so he was quite groggy when we got there, but there was already two people helping him," Epiha said.
"There was bikes sort of strewn all over the place. I believe one of the bikes was broken in half."
