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Giro d'Italia 2021 Giro d'Italia, Stage 8: Foggia – Guardia Sanframondi 170 km

Stage 8: Foggia – Guardia Sanframondi 170 km

Saturday, May 15th, 12.40 CEST


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Technical Overview:

A transitional stage in the southern Appennines. From the city of Foggia, the peloton will cross the mountains east to west. The first climb of the day is uncategorized (4.5km at 5.4%), and it comes after 30 km of flat roads. The route then goes through about 60 km of rolling terrain, including the first intermediate sprint to Campobasso, that is on quite a sizable slope of 4 km at 5%. This terrain ends at 70 km to go, where the road starts pointing up to the first categorized climb of the day: Bocca della Selva (GPM2, 18.9 km at 4.6%), a very gentle but long climb. It tops at 50 km to go, and its descent, much more interesting than the climb, is 18 km long, ending at 32 km to go. Here the peloton will find 21 km of descending false flat until 11 km to go, where the road starts ascending again slightly until the second intermediate sprint of Castelvenere, where the false flat starts rising steadily until the beginning of the final climb, at 3 km to go. Guardia Sanframondi (GPM4, 3 km at 6.9%) does include decent ramps, and features 2.5 km at 7.6% before the final flattish 500m.



Final Kilometers

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The Climbs:

Bocca della Selva: GPM2, 18.9 km at 4.6%


A long climb with some good gradients only in the second half.

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Guardia Sanframondi: GPM4, 3 km at 6.9%

Quite an interesting uphill finish. See the final kilometers for a profile.



What to expect:

This has breakaway written all over it. The GC guys could try to gain a few seconds on each other in the uphill finish, it is hard enough to see something.



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Guardia Sanframondi
 
This stage is basically a copy of todays just without the first 10 km of the final climb where nothing happened anyway.

Maybe a gc contender will attack on the final km, maybe there will be some downhill shenanigans. The most likely outcome seems to be another win for the break though.
 
This stage is basically a copy of todays just without the first 10 km of the final climb where nothing happened anyway.

Maybe a gc contender will attack on the final km, maybe there will be some downhill shenanigans. The most likely outcome seems to be another win for the break though.
Nah Bocca Della Selva is wayyy easier than what they had today, and the initial 10km of a climb are good to soften the legs anyway.

Breakaway very likely, sadly the final climb is bottom heavy which for an uphill finish of this kind shouldn't bode well.
 
Huge break and very difficult descent. Will QS mark the Ineos riders that will infiltrate the BotD?

Oh, and one last thing: Let it rain! (doesn't look likely, only a bit in the morning)

If I was QS, I'd do everything I can to get the best, biggest break on the road as possible.

If there's still bonus seconds on the line it's very possible Bernal could overtake Evenepoel on GC. Might not matter in the end for one reason or another, but I would expect Remco to want to wear the jersey eventually, and that could complicate it.
 
I wonder if Bernal will even try to distance Evenepoel here if there are no bonus seconds to be gained. Unless Evenepoel is obviously struggling that seems like a potential waste of energy. Best to keep it all in the tank for sunday.

Therefore, in that scenario, I expect someone like Yates or D. Martin to attack on the last climb and get like 5-10 seconds on Bernal and Evenepoel.
 
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