Today’s stage, the third last in the event, is another mountaintop finish, this time on top of the Macugnaga. The first climb of the day is the Mottarone, which is a 5.4% gradient over 16.3km. This climb is followed by a substantial flat section which will give riders time to recover before tackling the Macugnaga. This final climb is fairly unchallenging compared to the other climbs of this Giro. Even though it is 27.3km in length it only averages 4.1% over that distance and there are few steep ramps, certainly nothing over 10%. This may not suit Sella, who has been performing much better over the steep climbs. Regardless, he will hope to put time into Ricco before the time trial and this is his second last opportunity.
Starting the attacks off today is Dutch time trialists Joost Posthuma. He came so close to a victory yesterday and will be hoping to go better today.
He is followed by a whole host of riders. They are: Deignan Medvedev Orozco Zahner Bellotti Nocentini Brenes
The pack aren’t happy with Medvedev once again, and Bellotti is high enough up on GC to make some of the domestiques concerned about their own positions. As such Santander and Pearl pull the break back in. Of course this sparks off a whole new series of attacks. Over the course of a few kilometres the following riders form a group up the front:
Once again Medvedev has tried to slot himself into a group and once again the pack aren’t happy with that, especially when you consider the size of the group and the presence of yesterday’s winner Flügel. This time Nestle and Bacardi take responsibility and drag everything back together. Once again more attacks go almost immediately. This time the group is 10 riders initially, lead by Flügel.
Medvedev just won’t take a hint and he tries to bridge up with Bellotti and Deignan. The peleton don’t like this at all and several teams take responsibility to bring the entire race back together once again. Yet more attacks follow but the pace is incredibly high so no one gets a gap.
The peleton is still all together at the sprint point, 72km into the stage. Anza sprints for the points and somehow edges out Goss. Ulissi takes third place.
Morabito had gone with this sprint and now he continues on alone. No one seeks to join him up front for some time and his gap grows out to the 2 minute mark. Perhaps the rest of the teams are willing to let Festina off the hook?
Eventually, one rider decides that he wants to come across. This time it is Orozco. It takes some time for Orozco to make it up to the Swiss rider but he gets in just as the road starts to rise. The gap is out to 5 minutes. Both of these men are quite decent climbers and could definitely do something, but the lack of any other riders may hurt them as the stage goes on, particularly on the flat.
They share the work pretty well on the way up and the peleton stays pretty much together. Orozco takes the mountain prime ahead of Morabito, and their gap is out to 5’53”.
Ghisalberti leads the peleton over. Webeffect are really teeing this up for Sella and it looks like Vespa have plans too.
Over the flat the peleton really push the pace and by the time the final climb comes around the lead two riders have a gap of only 2’54” that is rapidly reducing. Things are sealed for the break when with 22.4km remaining, still on the early slopes of the climb, Kohl, Ardila and Marzano attack whilst in a tunnel.
They very quickly catch up to the breakaway riders who try to stick to their wheels. However, the peleton increased its pace as they kicked away and so they don’t get much further before they are brought in.
Just as they are brought in, another attack goes. This time it is Emanuele Sella!
There are still 13.8km left to ride so it looks like Sella is hoping that with a sudden acceleration now he will be able to grind out a gap on the others. It is not to be however, as the other favourites drag him in pretty quickly. Pozzovivo leads the chase and so the favourites are all back in the same fairly large group.
Not for long however, as now Henao and Machado try their hand.
They are soon joined by four more riders. It is Denifl, Menchov, Arroyo and, rather surprisingly, Ratiy. Ratiy was injured earlier in the race, though he seems to be riding better and better as the Giro goes on. He is currently sitting in 25th place and is rising almost every day. He could be making an assault on the top 20 here.
Behind, Ardila manages to drag this group back in. He doesn’t want to lose any more time on Menchov and Arroyo, thus keeping him vaguely competitive for a top 10.
Just as they are brought back in, Sella jumps again! He is timing his attacks well, hoping to find times where Ricco is blocked. This time, he certainly succeeds as Ricco has riders all around him.
Pozzovivo is the first man to try to go after him. Schleck tries to go with the pace, but he can’t manage it. He is clearly not enjoying today and is probably rather fatigued. Three other riders manage to get clear of the favourites and head off after Sella. They are Amador, Arroyo and Machado.
Ricco realises that no one else is going to drag this back for him and thus he attacks away alone. There are just under 5km to go and Sella’s lead is out to 30”, with Pozzovivo only 8” behind him.
Ricco puts in an incredibly acceleration and succeeds in pulling past Amador and straight up to Sella. Amador does pull his group up, however. He has been riding fantastically in this last week and may even be hoping to put time into Schleck today to get a shot at 4th place overall. So with 3km remaining a front group of 6 has formed. Arroyo has done well to get into this move after his time loss yesterday. No one is willing to work together in this group and they spread out around the road, looking at each other.
There are no attacks in the group and the uphill sprint starts in earnest. Ricco looks strong, but Sella is accelerating hard.
And Sella comes past to take yet another mountaintop victory! He also gets 8” as a time bonus over Ricco, who comes in second. That isn’t a massive gap but it will all count in the end. Pozzovivo gets a strong showing in third, ahead of Machado, Amador and Arroyo.
The chase group is lead in by Denifl in 7th place. Henao is 8th and Cataldo is 9th. They are 1’06” behind Sella and are also deemed to have a 10” gap over the rest of the group.
Menchov leads in this third ‘group’, which also contains Kohl, Ratiy, Schleck, Ardila and Devolder.
Though the make-up of the top 10 doesn’t change, some gaps have tightened and others widened. Amador is down to 3’26” behind Schleck for fourth place and he has thus extended his gap over Henao, who himself loses time to Machado in the battle for 6th place. Arroyo also extends his lead over Menchov in the fight for 10th place. Ratiy’s great ride has lifted him to 22nd and he could conceivably make up enough time to enter the top 20 by the end of the race.
Sella’s stage win puts him back in second place in the points, and Pozzovivo is looking close to overtaking Schleck in that competition too. Vesuvio manage to put more time into Vespa in the team classification, which might be some consolation for Schleck’s lagging performance in this third week. Wiggle also overtake Bacardi to move into third in that competition.
