With this fifth stage being categorised flat, the crash of multiple sprinters deserved a moment of time on camera. EF's Logan Owen, 3rd on the sole mass sprint so far, had to retire because of an injury he'd just sustained.
The breakaway group of three men arrived at the last climb with a 1'35" lead. Battaglin knew he was the better climber and set the pace himself on Pala Barzana. Bryon got dropped instantly, Debusschere fought back.
Knowing a good positioning would be crucial on the narrow climb, Ruben took it on sitting in third place. Bryon was reeled in, the other two gained more time. The pace set by Movistar also had to suit the sprinter Gaviria.
Battaglin was clearly the strongest of the two, but Debusschere refused to surrender completely. On the short bump in the last descent, he gave our man just 20". The reduced pack was down to 30, and sat 2'15" back.
That peloton lost Vandenborre, Colla and Zardini after a crash. Having gone down with 'em, Moreno Hofland became the next to leave the race.
Enrico's lead seemed comfortingly big, yet it started to melt away at an alarmingly high rate inside the ultimate kilometers; 13 secs with 2.3 left.
With 700m to go, Enrico got caught by three sprinters that had survived going over the climbs. Of them, Arnaud Demare was the strongest, as he landed a third WT win this year. He'd also won a TDU and Tirreno stage.
tsmoha wrote:
Unlucky finish for Enrico, but still a respectable result! And you're ahead of Morton in the GC now. That must be something good
And of course congrats to 100 sites with this story!
Don't think I ever went too slow in a breakaway instead of burning out too early. Happy we're in front of him for now, but he's got plenty of time left to move up again. A lot can happen with what's left in store.
The 5-man breakaway with Leveau, Van Staeyen, Dahl, Maas and Moser had to fight for a 25" inside the last 10 kms. When Moser attacked with 7 to go, the bunch had broken into multiple groups. All of us'd lost contact.
Escapees Houle, Nguyen, Roe and Durbridge had 2'25" left at the foot of the first climb. Knowing the last 65 kms were spiced up with six (!) hard climbs, the chances of winning were slim. First one: Valico della Valletta.
In the downhill after the second climb, some of our men once again were involved in a crash. In that area, Sam has been unlucky in the last days.
Fun image on the third climb: Bahrain domestiques Zakarin and Mamykin wanted to pace for Landa, but the race leader got boxed in on the narrow road. Once some space had opened up, Landa did not bridge the gap. GC 10th Mamykin lost Zakarin when Simon Clarke attacked from their group, but he gained a remarkable 3'40" on the Maglia Rosa group with 35 left.
On Casoni di Romagna, the penultimate climb, both Mamykin and Clarke caught up with Tim Roe, the very last survivor from the break of the day. Dimension Data, riding for GC 3rd König, brought the gap down to 1'50".
Nibali and Formolo joined the group, close to the top. None of the other GC men had been able to follow. Not Ruben, and not even Landa today.
Nibali and Formolo got rid of the others. Today's last difficulty was Muro di Campeggio, an unbelievably steep 2.2 km climb. They hit its partly tile paved road with 40" lead over Mikel Landa. Ruben did not have his best day; the Radio Corsa race radio put him 1'50" in arrears with 6 km to go.
Formolo and Nibali concentrated on putting more time into Landa instead of trying to shake one another, the perfect strategy. Don't let the image fool you, the men in the background were losing over one min and a half.
Ruben refound himself a little, backed by a very strong Enrico. Thanks to the latter they would both climb their way into the top 10 of the stage.
Formolo outsprinted Nibali for the stage, as the two of them climbed onto the overnight podium. Formolo is the first Italian stage victor this edition.
Landa won the sprint for third, yet still ended up losing more than 2'30". Finishing with him made BORA's Pierre-Roger Latour enter the GC top 5. Today may've proven something can be done about Landa's supremacy.
Ruben and Enrico came home in the E3 losing just 35" to Landa. Seeing what Nibali and Formolo did today, Ruben needs to believe he can, too. And why not in the third week, when he is supposed to hit his peak form.
Biggest losers of the day were Miguel A. López and Lachlan Morton, both former top 10 riders which now lost a remarkable 8+ mins to the winner.
Some nasty ones indeed, luckily no one's had to abandon so far.
valverde321 wrote:
What a stage, lots of excitement, and Ruben fought hard. The final climb with the paved stones look really nice too!
Had fun playing it too, though I had hoped to see a better form of the day for Ruben. Tiles looked amazing! A pleasant surprise when they suddenly popped up.
This is actually pretty cool. Any idea, where this comes from? Never noticed such a feature in PCM15, but needed it once or twice when doing stages.
GC shaping up nicely for Caja.
I think it's a modified road texture file the stagemaker put up for download on his personal website. I found one in 3D/Landscapes/Roads.
Regarding the GC, sorry to see Morton drop out of the top 10. But many contenders have had a disastrous day so far, he could be back sooner than you think.
The break of the day had 15 riders, including Fiorenzo Colla. He'd try to dictate on the first climb, Pian del Falco. The pack gave 'em 2'15" so far.
By the time Trek's Mannion attacked to grab the KoM points, only 4 other riders still sat close. The already thinned GC group rode 2'25" in arrears.
Bahrain put down the hammer on the next climb, Passo della Croce. Our man in the breakaway group was caught up with on the very first slopes.
The Bahrain train didn't slow down, it even caused Ruben to lose contact once all escapees had been reeled in. Six and a half km left until the top.
The dropping pace allowed Ruben to rejoin, after which other significant names started to struggle. Especially white jersey Rob Power and Nibali.
Mannion attacked to win the second mountain sprint as well. That way he would become Mikel Landa's closest competitor for the azure KoM jersey.
In the descent, a small elite group swept up Mannion. Beside Landa and various domestiques, it also featured most of the GC top 10 incl. Ruben. Thanks to the length of the downhill, the E2 group caught up again too.
As soon as the Bahrain train started to rumble up the climb to Boveglio, Ruben turned out to have another day where the legs were not bad, but not good either. Mikel Landa broke clear with three more men in support.
Landa lost two of them, then Mamykin set the pace in an elite group with Landa, König, Formolo & Latour. They would quickly put 48" into Ruben.
Formolo upped the pace, which caused Mamykin to get dropped. Latour, König struggled and were happy to arrive at the top riding 5m in arrears.
Sure about gaining some valuable time, these four sprinted for the stage.
Pink jersey Mikel was the strongest and landed a third stage win already.
Concluding in 11th, Guerreiro again lost a load of time without cracking.
Now that the riders in Italy are enjoying a day's rest after 9 stages, I'm going to report on the 3-stage Vuelta a Galicia first before picking up the Giro again, even though both races take place simultaneously.
Giro d'Italia (2.GT) 
Harsh day for Ruben, that early move by Formolo and Lopez came at the worst moment.
