Wiggins, 32, who capped a triumphant year by winning a gold medal at the London Olympics, was hit by a car pulling out of a petrol station in Wrightington, north-west of Manchester, on Wednesday afternoon. Wiggins lives in nearby Eccleston and is known to take training rides on rural roads in the area.

The Lancashire Evening Post reported Wiggins might have broken several ribs as well as sustaining hand and wrist injuries.

Local police had refused to provide any details of his injuries but a spokesman said they were ''not thought to be life-threatening''.

Team Sky said on its website Wiggins was ''being kept in hospital overnight for observation but the injuries he has sustained are not thought to be serious and he is expected to make a full and speedy recovery''.

The collision came three months after Wiggins called for drivers and cyclists to ''co-exist'' following a fatal accident just outside London's Olympic Park.

Petrol station attendant Yasmin Smith, who rushed to Wiggins' aid after the collision, told The Lancashire Evening Post: "By the time I got there he had moved to a safer place but was still on the ground and he was in a lot of pain.

"He said he thought he had broken his ribs and while a lot of police cars arrived it was about 15 minutes before the ambulance got there, by which time he was blue."

The collision sent Wiggins flying over his handlebars and happened while on a training ride with his support team, The Sun reported. "They were following him in a van and they helped him out after the crash,'' a source told The Sun. ''We think he's going to be fine, but I don't know how quickly he'll be back on his bike."

Police were interviewing the woman driver of a Vauxhall Astra. She was unhurt.

On August 1, the same day Wiggins won a gold medal in London, a cyclist was killed after a collision with an Olympic media shuttle bus just outside the city's Olympic Park.

With afp