The young Tour de France winner who broke “almost 20” bones when he crashed into a bus on a motorway has miraculously returned to training – despite being told he had a 95 per cent chance of becoming paraplegic two months ago.

Egan Bernal, 25, from the Colombian capital Bogota, crashed at speed into a stationary bus on a highway in the Colombian municipality of Gachancipa on 24th January.

He told his 1.3 million Instagram followers on 4th February: “Almost 20 broken bones: eleven ribs, femur, kneecap, fifth and sixth thoracic vertebrae, odontoids, metacarpal, a thumb, a knocked-out tooth, both lungs perforated.”

Bernal added: “I almost died, but you know what? I’m grateful to God for giving me this test. It’s been the hardest race, but I’ve had an excellent group of people around me.

One of Bernal’s operations set out to achieve “biomechanical stability of the cervical spine”. The op yielded “excellent clinical results” and was accomplished “without complications”.

It followed several other successful operations, some of them major, with the young cyclist now strong enough to get back on his bike.

Bernal, who won the won the Tour de France in 2019, becoming the first Latin American rider to do so and the youngest winner in over a century, had previously revealed he had been given a “95 per cent chance of becoming paraplegic” and had “almost lost his life” in the crash.

However, the cyclist shared images of him training on his bike again on Instagram, where he now boasts 1.4 million followers.

Bernal also appeared to mock his cycling pals in the message, writing: “Second day on the bike! Either I haven’t lost my level or they haven’t improved at all!”

The video, viewed 600,000 times in one day, shows Bernal overtaking a couple of companions on the road before building up a head of steam.

Bernal’s coach, Xabier Artexte, has not ruled out the possibility that the cyclist may compete again before the end of the 2022 season.