After yesterday’s action-packed stage, the race organisers have given us another stage that promises lots of excitement. It is a rolling course that comes in at 193.6km. The race may not have the same decisive punch as yesterday, however, because there is in fact a descent to the line just over 3km in length, which means that plenty of attacking riding up the two final hills should be expected. Niether of these hills are categorised, however, with the only categorised hill being the Soriano al Cimino, which gives out 5/3/1 points. It also means that the favourites today might not want to burn too much energy, so a breakaway could do rather well. Speaking of the favourites, today’s list is rather similar to yesterday’s list. The biggest names are: Frank Schleck Simone Ponzi Riccardo Ricco Francesco Ginanni Diego Ulissi Tiago Machado
It takes 8km for the attacks to start today, and the first two men out of the block are Italian domestique Manuel Quinziato and the winner of Stage two of this year’s Giro Enrico Franzoi.
These two are quickly joined by four more riders, who are: Tendero Vangheel Sergent Weiss
This is Tendero’s third attempt to be in a breakaway in this Giro, after being in it on stages 3 and 4. These two breakaways have given him enough points so that he is only 3 points behind Chtioui in the mountain classification. Weiss and Sergent have both already been in one breakaway apiece this race.
As these 6 riders come together, several more seek to get away. The first two are Jacobs and Bernaudeau. As they start to pull away, four more try to follow in their tracks. They are: Verbist Merino Criado Chtioui Rijntjes
Clearly Chtioui realises the threat that Tendero presented to his jersey and so he tries to get away with several other companions.
Several of the teams are unhappy with this many riders, because 12 strong men present a real threat. As such Jack Wolfskin, Wiggle and Bacardi decide to chase down these two groups of riders. This doesn’t necessarily deter all attacks, however, because just as the chase groups are reeled in Kruijswijk decides that he wants to bridge to the 6 riders up the front.
Wiggle in particular seem unhappy with the make up of the group up front, so they put the hammer down. With 11km to go before the mountain points, yesterday’s winner Pavarin has successfully dragged in all the riders up the front. And the race is all back together. Of course, with a mountain jersey within reach for many riders, there are more attacks. The first four to try to get away are: Franzoi Weiss Chtioui Quinziato
Weiss has enough points in the mountain classification to represent a real threat to Chtioui’s hold on the jersey, so Chtioui was forced to go with the attack to defend it. UBS will be pleased that he is giving it everything to hold onto this for as long as possible.
These four riders pull out a decent gap and start to work together as the race hits the climb. The peleton is not as happy as the break are, however, and Michael Schär decides to try his luck by a bridging move to the breakaway.
This sets off a few other attacks, first by: Rijntjes Sergent Vangheel
Then by Vandousselaere and Kruijswijk.
None of these 6 riders have managed to get up to the front group by the time the leaders get to the summit of the KOM prime for the today, however, and so the 4 men are left to sprint it out. Weiss needs to win this and for Chtioui to not get any points to pull on the jersey tonight. He is clearly the strongest on the way up and leads the group over the top. Quinziato sprints with him and takes 2nd. Slightly behind, however, Franzoi shows no interest in this competition and so he lets Chtioui take the one point that he needs to hold onto the jersey for one more night.
Behind, Rinjtjes is dropped from the group lead by Vangheel and is picked up by that lead by Kruijswijk. He stills looks uncomfortable, however, and is dropped by this chase group on the descent down from the summit, leaving 10 riders in various groups out the front. At the summit the situation is this:
1’15”
28”
19”
56”
2’58”
4 Leaders
--->
Schär
--->
Vang/Serg
--->
Kruij/Vand
--->
Peleton
With 132km remaining in the race, and thus 62km raced, all of the breakaway riders except Rijntjes have come together. In terms of GC, Kruijswijk is easily the best of the rider, sitting on 2’37” behind. Given that he is no threat to the favourites, they are clearly unconcerned with this fact. Rijntjes is clearly having a bad day, but he perseveres and hovers about 1’40” behind the breakaway.
In the peleton the break is not allowed to get beyond 7’50”. The low pace is not without its drama, however, as Mathieu Perget falls. This is a small blow for the race leader, who was probably counting on Perget to do a lot of work on the bumpier stages like today. Regardless, he doesn’t lose any time and is back up the front in no time.
He is relatively lucky, however, because as Vesuvio and Festina start increasing the pace and people start coming to the front, Arthur Vichot falls and it looks quite serious. Ultimately, he takes the tough decision to drop out of the race. Devolder will now find himself one domestique short on the flat stages.
Rijntjes is caught not long afterward, with 78km remaining. The gap is now at 7’00” but steadily decreasing. Bos is dropped from the peleton and several of his teammates go back for him once again.
Not much happens for the next 30km of racing, as the gap slowly decreases. But with 48 remaining and the gap down to 4’31”, the road starts to steadily rise towards the sprint point. Seeing an opportunity for a surprise, Aleksandar Flügel launches an attack from the bunch.
His is followed by two other accomplished puncheurs. They are Andrea Moletta and none other than yesterday’s winner Marcello Pavarin. All three of these many are obviously huge threats for the stage victory if they are allowed to get much leeway.
The threats off the front of the group lead to a general raising of the tempo. This causes the bunch to split and ironically Flügel’s teammate Marzano is the biggest name dropped. He is clearly injured however, and so will just be hoping he can try something in the last week of the race.
The leaders gets up the easy slope without too much trouble and at the sprint point the only one who shows any interest at all is Kruijswijk, being the best placed on GC. He goes over first, and is followed by Weiss and Schär. Everyone is more interested in the time gaps, however. Under the banner with 33.6km to go, the gaps are:
2’37”
52”
3’29”
9 Leaders
--->
3 Chasers
--->
Peleton
Here is the profile of the last 35km of the race:
Everything is still touch-and-go at this point, so Vesuvio, Webbefect and Bacardi all put in some work on the front. These are the teams of the 3 big favourites for the race, so things are probably going to get serious. They start to pull things back in slowly, so that with 21km to go at the base of the penultimate climb, the leaders have a 2’53” gap back to the peleton and the chasers are only 47” ahead of the pack.
Up front, a short way into the climb, Quinziato decides to test the legs of his companions and puts in an attack.
Almost simultaneously, his Vespa teammate Francesco Ginanni puts in a big effort. He didn’t do much yesterday so he was clearly trying to keep his powder dry for today.
Ginanni pulls himself up to the 3 chasing puncheurs, whereas Quinziato is less successful and is brought back into the lead group. His is not the only big attack, however, because with 1km left until the summit of the first climb Frank Schleck launches his bid for glory.
Ricco considers going with it, but sits up and lets his team take over on front, together with Webeffect. This also causes some fracturing of the peleton, and Stijn Devolder once again finds himself to not be in the front group! These attacks have seen the gaps drastically reduced:
1’09”
16”
16”
1’41”
9 Leaders
--->
4 Chasers
--->
Schleck
--->
Peleton
On the flat, Schleck speeds past the 4 chasers. Ginanni realises that this may be the best chance for a stage win and, in a tremendous show of strength, pulls the other chasers up to the Liege-Bastogne-Liege winner. Taking advantage of this, Flügel and Pavarin go past the other three chasers and try to work their way up to the front group. They make it just at the base of the final climb of the day, making a group of 11 riders 53” ahead of the Peleton, who reel in Schleck and the other chasers.
Before the climb begins, however, there is yet more drama as several big names go down. They are: Andrei Amador Tiago Machado Marcus Fothen
Amador and Machado get back up on their bike fairly quickly and end up in the same group as Devolder. Fothen, however, is bleeding fairly badly and holding his right shoulder. The race doctors come up to him and, fearing a break, they advise him to drop out of the race. Grudgingly, he agrees and thus the 2010 Tour de France winner drops out of the Giro d’Italia. Festina-CONEC’s goal of a top 10 overall looks to be in absolute tatters now.
The race continues on, however, and with 10km remaining, at the beginning of the final climb, Ginanni and Levarlet attack away. Ginanni clearly has put all his eggs in one basket with today’s stage. Levarlet looked good with his second place yesterday and has to be considered a real danger man for the stage victory.
These two easily bridge up to the leaders and start to push the pace a bit. Bacardi and Webeffect start to breathe down their neck however, and the front group is caught when a fresh bunch of attacks occurs. The three attackers this time are: Diego Ulissi Emanuele Sella Andrea Moletta
Ulissi will really want this one as his GC leader has just withdrawn. The finish is similar to Milan – San Remo, which he won this year, so if he can get over the top with some time to spare, he should do well. Sella will want to put some time into Ricco and Schleck.
These three succeed in reeling in the leaders, who all look absolutely exhausted. Ulissi kicks away from the others, who are also caught by the charging peleton and tries to go it alone. Ginanni is the only other rider who tries to go over the top ahead of the group.
With 3.3km to go the bunch crests the summit. Ulissi holds 12” over Ginanni and another 8” on the peleton. This is clearly not enough, so he starts his sprint early in an effort to widen the gap as Ginanni draws even with him.
Behind these two, Pozzovivo is well placed as third wheel. Flügel is behind him, with Moletta on his wheel and Ghisalberti is just behind him. Levarlet is on the wheel of all these riders.
Levarlet starts to come through all of these riders. Clearly he didn’t put everything into his earlier attack. On his wheel, however, is the pink jersey of Ricco. Ricco is very well positioned and his decision to not follow Schleck earlier was obviously the right one.
Pozzovivo comes through up front, going past Ulissi. Levarlet is still charging.
Then Ricco makes his move. He uses his vicious turn of speed to blow right past everyone and to pull even with Pozzovivo with 1km remaining. Behind him, however, Schleck is giving it everything he has to avoid losing any more time. Santo Anza is on his wheel.
Pozzovivo starts to struggle as Ricco pulls away. Schleck continues to charge, pulling past Pozzovivo as well. Anza, however, leaps off Schleck’s back wheel and into second place.
It is too little, too late, however, as Ricco takes the stage victory.
Anza keeps his strong second place on the stage, with Schleck in third. Thanks to these two, the first 52 riders all get the same time. In fourth place is a strong-finishing Denifl, ahead of Pavarin, then Ulissi, Carrara is 7th, Ginanni is 8th, Pozzovivo fades into 9th and Talabardon rounds out the top 10.
Amador, Machado and Devolder all lost 3’23” today, which means that they all slide down the rankings. Devolder is not more than 10 minutes down, so he will definitely be a candidate for a stage win later in the race.
Looking now at the jerseys, Ricco obviously solidifies his hold on both the pink leader’s jersey as well as the red point jersey, which Schleck is second in. Chtioui defends his mountain jersey and Ponzi is still the best young rider. Things should change after tomorrow’s stage, however, when the first real mountains of the race will be faced.
