The 20th stage has arrived, and with it the last mountain top finish of the race, atop the Sestriere. Before the riders even think about that finish line however, they still have to tackle the 19.8km, 8.5% average Col delle Finestre. As if that climb needed to be harder, the last several kilometres of it are covered in gravel roads. Further complicating today’s course is the inexplicable choice to make it 242.2km in length, which should really see who still has some petrol left in the tank after three weeks of really intense racing. The big question on everyone’s lips today is this – does Emanuele Sella have what it takes to seize the pink jersey from Riccardo Ricco on the eve of the final time trial? Conventional wisdom says that Sella probably needs to take the jersey today and have, as a very minimum 30 seconds on his rival in order to win the Giro.
The first attack of the morning comes from Vaugrenard.
He is followed fairly quickly by: Offredo Bellotti Kvasina Hernandez Guttierez Zahner Zaugg Kruijswijk
There are some fairly strong climbers in this group. It is also great to see that Vesuvio are still determined to get into a break, even if Medvedev has failed to do so the last couple of days. Several of the teams of the favourites have placed riders up here, perhaps in the hope that they might be of some use down the track.
The gap grows out to over a minute and a half, when another large group of riders try to come across to join in. They are: Rubiano Chavez Posthuma Deignan Margaliot Flugel Danacik Gallego Cornu Nocentini
Jack Wolfskin are trying to put three men up front, though it must be said that all three would be far better off waiting for tomorrow as none of them are true climbers.
The group is now completely bloated and any attack of this size is going to pose a threat, so most of the big GC teams work together very well and shut the attack down. Ghisalberti makes the catch.
This is not going to deter several of the riders who just attacked. A new group forms, comprising entirely of riders from these two previous groups. The full list of names is: Deignan Hernandez Guttierez Nocentini Kvasina Rubiano Chavez Zaugg Vaugrenard Zahner Kruijswijk Bellotti
In addition Flugel and Danacik bridge up about a minute apart, over the course of about 40km.
The lead of the break hits a maximum of 10’20” with 115km of racing still to go. Webeffect and Vespa work together to lift the pace. Both teams are down to 5 riders, but by working together their lack of domestiques doesn’t show and so they start to pull in the break fairly quickly.
Flugel leads the break through the sprint point, ahead of Bellotti and Vaugrenard. With 98.5km to go the lead is already down to 8’48”.
By the start of the Finestre the gap has decreased even further. It is down to 4’49” as Grabovski leads the peleton onto the climb.
Up front Vaugrenard and Kruijswijk rather unsurprisingly are almost immediately struggling to keep up.
In the peleton Terciado has started to tear things to shreds. A number of GC riders are caught out. Gonzalo is thankfully near his leader Arroyo and paces up both him and a couple of other favourites such as Machado. The only GC riders behind now are Menchov, Devolder and Keinath.
With about 14km left to the summit the first attack goes from the favourites. Denifl launches himself off the front of the group.
Denifl comes up to the Vaugrenard and Kruijswijk, whose gap is now virtually nonexistent. All three of these men are brought back though as Ricco sits on the front of the peleton and sets the pace. Some riders are put into trouble, but Menchov takes a chance to bridge up to the leaders.
Ricco goes back into the group and the pace slows a bit. Sensing another opportunity, Denifl attacks again.
This time he gets all the way up the lead riders and sits in for a while to catch his breath. Unfortunately, this is all the time that the GC riders behind need to catch up and neutralise his gap. There are now 10km left to the top of the Finestre.
With 8.5km to the top Denifl tries yet again. Clearly he is feeling incredibly good and wants to put some time into everyone else while he has the strength in his legs. This time however, he is followed by none other than Ricco!
Arroyo gets onto the front of the leaders’ group and pushes the pace. He succeeds in shutting down the gap and the favourites are all together again. They get onto the gravel section and Sella hits the front of the group, trying to hurt some legs. Devolder is riding well behind the group and has almost caught up.
The top 12 riders in the Giro are all together in the lead group now with about 5km to the summit. Every single one of them is giving it everything they have.
Denifl goes once again with 4500 metres to the summit. Amador, Arroyo and Henao follow this move.
Henao puts in a clever attack as the road steepens again, and tries to get away. Amador follows his move, which will probably annoy Henao who really wants Amador’s 5th place. Either way the two of them succeed in pulling out a 40” gap over the favourites.
With 2.5km to go to the summit the attack that everyone has been waiting for finally comes – Sella goes off the front!
Menchov and a well-recovered Devolder try to follow this move, but can’t! Sella absolutely blazes up the road. In what seems like no time at all he has brought himself up to Amador and Henao, almost 2 minutes ahead of Ricco’s group.
Surprisingly Machado is the first one in Ricco’s group to try to close the gap down to the other riders up the road. Ricco follows his attack at first and then goes past him, determined to do this alone.
Machado sits up and is happy to work with Schleck and Pozzovivo. Ardila, meanwhile, is unhitched by this acceleration.
At the front of the race Henao leads his group over the climb, ahead of Sella and Amador. Denifl manages to join onto their group just before the summit.
The situation is as follows:
37”
28”
23”
Sella Group (4)
--->
Arroyo
--->
Ricco
--->
Schleck Group (6)
Over the top Pozzovivo and Schleck realise that something has to be done to keep in contact. They attack together through the first few corners and drag themselves up to Ricco, who has also caught Arroyo. This forms a chase group of 4 behind the 4 leaders, with a third group of 4 behind these riders and Ardila on his own behind them.
Eventually, however, the pace proves too much for Arroyo, who is dropped from the first chase group. The gap from the leaders to the first chase group is 47” at the base of the descent. There is a short flat section before the Sestriere begins. The Sestriere is a climb that builds up gently, so the early slopes are essentially flat. The front group appears to be working well until there is an attack. Rather predictably, it comes from Denifl.
He gets a decent gap and holds it over the gentle rise, but as it starts to steepen Sella gets onto the front of his group and puts the hammer down. He knows that this is one of the best chances he will ever have of taking a victory in the Giro. His rise in speed widens the gap to just outside a minute.
Sella isn’t the only one who realises just how important these final kilometres are. Ricco puts in an attack 5km out from the finish. Schleck goes with him, but Pozzovivo just can’t find that extra gear!
Ricco can’t sustain his attack for long, and instead he raises the pace and is determined to just grind this out. He closes the gap remarkably quickly.
Just as he is about to get up to Sella’s group, Sella raises the tempo that he is setting as well. This proves too much for the Amador, Denifl and Henao, who drop back to see if they can hold onto Ricco. Sella’s gap begins to go out again.
With less than a kilometre to go Sella can’t pull out too much but Ricco is still forced onto the back foot. Sella comes through with yet another mountain top victory! He has most certainly earned that mountain jersey and no one can dispute any claim that he has been the absolute stand-out climber of this year’s Giro.
Ricco’s acceleration results in a gap to all of the other riders, but more importantly he comes through 35” down on Sella which, when added to the 8 extra bonus seconds that Sella got today, means that Ricco is still 13” ahead on GC. Things will truly come down to the time trial tomorrow!
Amador caps off a great week of climbing with fourth place, though he will be disappointed not to put time into Schleck today. Denifl is fifth and Henao is sixth, comfortably defending his young rider’s jersey. Pozzovivo comes through 1’35” behind Sella, 40” down on the time of Amador. He will probably be disappointed by that but he has still probably done enough to secure his podium place.
The group of Devolder, Arroyo, Machado, Menchov and Kohl come through 3’31” down, with Kohl losing another 17” from being gapped in the finale. He is still better off than Ardila, however, who cracked and lost a total of 6’06” on the time of Sella today.
Denifl’s time gain on Machado proves to be enough to move him into 7th place. Devolder moves up into 13th which, considering his crash-marred race, is a rather good effort. Ratiy also joins the top 20 after finishing 17th today in one of the many shattered groups that trickled over. Vespa was the best team today and are once again under 10 minutes away from Vesuvio, but with only the time trial to go it is hard to see the closing that. Sella can also celebrate his mountain jersey, though green is not the colour he is aiming for.
Looking ahead to tomorrow there are several GC placings that will be sorted out once and for all. Obviously Ricco and Sella fighting it out for pink is going to be big focus, but Denifl and Machado are separated by just 4 seconds for 7th place. Depending on how big the gaps are tomorrow Menchov might be hoping to move into tenth place in place of Arroyo. Tomorrow’s finale will no doubt prove to be absolutely incredible.
