Yesterday’s stage saw an epic battle atop the Zoncolan, where Sella romped to victory in convincing fashion. The big question today is this – can he string together another dominating mountain performance and close the gap to pink-jersey wearer Ricco? Ricco has been in yellow since the end of stage 4 and did not show any major signs of losing crucial time on anyone else until yesterday.
Today’s stage can be summed up in one word – epic. There are 5 categorised climbs, including the summit finish atop the Gardeccia. Along the way are some truly ferocious climbs. The first is the 13.3km, 8.5% average Piancavallo. The road then steadily climbs towards the second mountain of the day, the Forcella Cibiana, which is almost 10km long. After a short descent the road steadily climbs again before beginning the climb to the Cima Coppi, the highest point in the Giro this year, the Passo di Giau. At almost 16km in length it is immensely long, if not as steep as other climbs today. The descent leads straight on to the Passo di Fedaia, which is 13km long and again averages over 8%. Finally, the steady descent takes the riders to the base of the final climb of the day, the Gardeccia, which is only 6.1km in length, but at an absolutely brutal 9.5% average. All in all, an absolutely insane day that takes in a total of 229km of racing.
Even on a day like today, there are riders who are looking to join the break. The first man to start things off is a familiar name – Gracjan Lejman.
This starts off a large number of riders trying to come across. Their names are:
Teklehaimanot Rijntjes Mendes Gonzalo Brenes Margaliot Kruijswijk Hoffman Donald
These are too many riders and Pearl are quickly on the case to defend Machado’s chances today. They run things down fairly quickly. It takes a short while for a new attack to go and this time it is:
Bacardi keep the pace fairly high. Because of this, several riders can’t make it all the way to the front. The front five riders are now Cornu, Rubiano Chavez, Margaliot, Rijntjes and Montoya. Even so, the pace is so high that at the very base of the climb, Grabovski reels them in, so that onto the first mountain of the day the race is together. As if the day wasn’t hard enough, rain starts to fall as well.
The first ramps on the Piancavallo are over 18% in gradient. This fact, combined with the fact that a lot of non-climbers are still in the group, causes a couple of issues with traffic, and as leaders are caught up, their domestiques wait for them. All this has the effect of causing a break. Up the front of the peleton, Grabovski just sets a calm pace and Ricco sits on his wheel. They detach from the peleton.
Behind, people start to realise what is happening and Medvedev comes to the front. He brings the two Bacardi riders back in and the peleton starts to sort itself out. 74 riders are in the lead group, with the biggest name missing being Suaza.
With 1km remaining to the top of this long climb, Rubiano Chavez puts in a dig. He sits up near the top, however, and clearly just wanted the mountain points as well as the bragging rights of getting to the top first. Medvedev roles over in 2nd and Terciado is 3rd.
The group stays together on the descent, with no one wanting to take a risk with all the rain. Finally, however, with the descent completed and the slow climb to the next mountain beginning, a real breakaway goes. The two riders are Montoya and Curfs. Neither of them are anywhere even close on GC, so everyone is happy to let them go. On a slight rise Meier bridges up to the group, creating a lead break of three riders.
The slow and steady rise allows the second group on the road to come back in, including Suaza. The peleton now numbers 103 riders, with all of the best climbers in it. This stay together calmly up the second climb of the day. Everyone realises that they need to save their energy.
Up front, Meier leads the group over the summit, ahead of Montoya and Curfs. They have a 4’16” gap and snow is falling all about them.
At the base of the Passo di Giau the break has a lead of 4’40”. Not far in, however, Curfs is dropped. He is just pedalling squares. This is going to be a very tough next few hours for him. Similarly, on a 12% ramp Meier succeeds in unhitching Montoya.
Bacardi are still leading the peleton and they have raised the pace. With 5km to the top of the climb Meier has only 2’40”. The pace continues and with 1.3km remaining the lead is down to 1’42”. Seeing an opportunity, Morabito puts in an attack.
Morabito can’t really get far, however, and he is brought back in before the summit. He puts in another small attack with about 50 metres remaining to the peak and takes the mountain points for second place. Meier comes over alone 1’25” ahead of the pack. The peleton has been reduced to 71 riders. Today he has managed to get 36 points, which is enough to put him in a provisional 5th for that jersey.
The descent is blissfully uneventful. Through the sprint at the base of the Passo di Fedaia, teh gap to Meier is down to 1’07” and it is clear that he is going to be caught very soon.
Indeed, on the very early slopes of the climb Ponzi puts in an attack that goes straight past Meier. Ponzi has had an absolutely magnificent Giro thus far and he has used his skills as a puncheur to get enough time to currently be sitting 15th on GC and 3rd in the young rider classification.
14th on GC Matteo Carrara chases him back fairly quickly. Ponzi’s attack was clearly a signal to the GC contenders that the gloves are out, as the next two riders to attack are Kohl and Amador.
Devolder and Menchov are quick to follow onto their wheels. Amador is clearly on fine form, however, and he gets a 30” gap on the others who attacked with him, who themselves have 30” on the peleton.
Seeing Amador getting this sort of gap, Arroyo and Henao Montoya both put in an attack. Denifl is straight onto their wheel.
Kohl succeeds in dragging Henao, Arroyo and Menchov up to Amador. Devolder and Denifl, meanwhile, fall off the pace somewhat.
None of the top 4 in the race have reacted to any of these attacks yet, preferring to see if any one of them are willing to work. The man who eventually takes up the pace is yesterday’s stage winner Sella. He brings Ricco, Schleck, Pozzovivo, Marzano and Carrara up with him.
Ardila and Samwel, sitting in 11th and 12th ahead of Menchov in 13th have both missed this selection and are sitting about 30” behind. Also with them is 8th place Machado
With the selection of 13 lead riders now made, Sella sets the pace well. Marzano and Carrara both fall off the pace and Carrara is absolutely blown. He falls back behind the Machado group and will have to limp in on his own later. Things get even harder for the riders up front as Sella puts in a big attack with 2km left to the peak! There are 28.7km to go and with 2’36” to make up on Ricco he has to do something special here. The crowd goes absolutely wild.
Pozzovivo and Amador try to come across to him, but Sella is just in a class of his own today. He pulls out a gap on these two and an even bigger gap on the favourites. The favourites group meanwhile, has completely splintered. Machado manages to fight his way up to Ricco’s group, but neither Amador or Samwel can go with him. The situation over the summit is as follows:
Sella
Pozzo/Amador
+30”
Kohl/Ricco/Henao/Schleck/Arroyo/Machado
+40”
(+1’10”)
Denifl/Menchov/Devolder/Marzano
+24”
(+1’34”)
Ardila/Samwel
+44”
(+2’18”)
Seeing the pink jersey slipping away from him, Ricco spurs into action. On the downhill he attacks out of his group and descends like a madman.
Pozzovivo is also descending well and he and Amador make contact with Sella just as Ricco catches up as well. This creates a front group of four riders – Sella, Ricco, Pozzovivo and Amador. Pozzovivo appears to be riding himself onto the podium with Schleck missing this crucial move.
Behind these four, Arroyo has attacked from his group alone, perhaps in an effort to put time into Kohl. As he leaps out of the group, Denifl brings the other three riders with him up to Schleck’s group. This proves to be rather unfortunate for Arroyo, because the extra numbers mean that a chase can be more effectively organised. Arroyo is caught before the beginning of the climb.
Up front, they hit the Gardeccia with a gap of 1’39”. As said at the start this is 6.1km in length, with an average of over 9%. Some sections ramp up over 16%.
Behind, not long after starting the climb, Schleck and Machado launch an attack to try to bridge up to the front group. With 5km remaining this is going to be a tough ask. Henao goes with them.
They don’t make much of a dent in the gap and their work becomes even harder as Sella kicks once again in a section with a gradient over 10%!
Ricco starts to work with Pozzovivo to bring him back but Sella is an absolute demon. Neither of them seem to have enough left in the tank at this point.
Amador starts to fall off the pace in one of the 16% segments and will be hoping he has done enough to overtake Denifl in 6th.
With 1km to go Sella’s lead is just over a minute. Ricco has to keep working to minimise his losses.
Today, Sella allows himself the luxury of celebrating yet another absolutely magnificent victory. Everyone starts watching the clock.
Ricco clearly has a little bit left on the run in and he manages to gap Pozzovivo, but that isn’t what everyone wants to know.
Ricco comes through in 2nd 1’32” down, putting his lead in the overall down to 56” ahead of the mountain time trial. Pozzovivo is 18” later, but the important thing is that he has moved himself into 3rd place on GC.
Amador is 2’25” down on Sella’s time and everyone is still waiting for the chase group to arrive. Eventually, 3’35” after the winner crosses the line Schleck leads the other GC riders through. That puts his gap to Pozzovivo at 1’35”, plus Pozzovivo’s 8 bonus seconds.
Machado manages 6th place, which is good considering he initially missed the cut. In 7th is Henao Montoya, ahead of Arroyo and Kohl.
Devolder leads in the second wave of favourites in 10th place, almost 6 minutes down on Sella’s time.
Today brings another immense list of people withdrawing. B&O lost 4 of their riders today and Colombia 3. A number of sprinters dropped out today, with Rowe being amongst them. The full list is:
**Note that the results didn’t export properly, so here are the screenshots for the results. I’ve done the first 50 riders for results and GC and the top 10 in the others. If you want anything more specific, feel free to ask and I’ll get the information for you.
