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Giro d'Italia 2022 Giro d'Italia, Stage 17: Ponte di Legno – Lavarone 168 km (Wednesday, May 25th)

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That was a fun stage.

I knew VD Poel wouldn't win as he'd need about 3 minutes on the chasers and even Leemreize is a better climber than him normally. And it turned out to be that way as Vd Poel finished even behind the GC contenders he had a 5 min lead out. It's logic.

Buitrago the climber with the most fresh legs in that group. Hirt and Carthy had already given a lot the day before. Leemreize a bit too short.
 
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Beautiful mountain scenery, lots of suffering from the riders - congrats to Buitrago!

On a side note Wiggins was funny trying to get to Buitrago for a post-race interview because Buitrago had already been surrounded by various media people, I actually am really starting to like Wiggins as a boots on the ground kind of commentator. Didn't know he had it in him.
 
Don‘t know why Hindley did not attack on the last climb. Carapaz‘ face told us he (Carapaz) had pain like maybe never before. Hindley‘s face and body looked just as if Hindley was riding to the startline of stage one.

Strange…
Hindley might be like Kuss, who looks efortless even when he gets dropped. We've also seen Carapaz playing possum before, at the last Tour de France. That said, Hindley really should have tried something, but I feel like he'll only go all out on Fedaia...
 
A fine win by Buitrago after coming up just short on Sunday. Glad that Bahrain has one in the bag so they can go all out for Landa in the next few days.

Good to see the return of Wout Poels superdomestique extraordinaire as well; having the 2015 Sky first-class carriages pulling in opposite directions was fun. I guess Hindley is really confident in his TT because he seems to be saving his bullets in prime shooting grounds. And with Almeida well and truly gapped is no one might want to move on Friday, the 15km of valley roads makes it so that the only way to make a sensible attack is with satellite riders which Ineos won't want to let up the road. So we might have to wait until Fedaia for Carapaz and Hindley to let loose. Landa or maybe even Nibali to the rescue?

The coverage does seem a bit off. They seem to have plenty of motorbikes -too many for racing purposes- but they just sat on guys for too long. I'd rather have them alternate and forth a bit more and maybe replay an attack if you miss it but YMMV. At the end of the day the battle of the break ended up being more compelling that the battle behind but you should be able to do a bit of both. Maybe having a close-up central compelling narrative is better for the casual fan but on a real GC day like today, even your average viewer feels a bit in the dark. While attacks may be more attractive a little attrition helps build the drama, even a helicopter shot of a thinning bunch whets the appetite and makes even the plainer entrees feel more satisfying.
 
Yeah, it's actually funny.
Like I was thinking today we got bigger gaps than yesterday, that little bit of rolling terrain on top of the final climb did in fact increase the gaps.
The top 3 on the gc in one group, but the 4th 1min back and the 5th another min behind, the gaps were decent.
It's pretty basic game theory tbh. Or you just make sure your body language is consistent, but it's so hard to do when you're breaking.

But there's way too much "x is strong and y is weak" based on body language alone, and then entire strategies get flamed for it.
 
It’s been a dreadful race. Terrible design that hasn’t really allowed anyone to do anything. Even with fireworks this weekend it won’t make up for the fact that this race has been a snoozer because nobody besides Landa is really trying to drop anyone and he’s not strong enough anymore to do it.
They're simply on the same level. No attacks, because nobody can stay away.

This is the 2011 Giro d'Italia we never got, because Contador was there. Well, unless Gadret would have won it accidentally.
 
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Great stage, horrendous broadcast as it has been in the last stages. It’s all pointing to stage 20 to decide this giro. Would it be funny if Hindley and Carapaz reach the itt with a few seconds between them. Almeida out of contention and starts to point that unless he finds some legs for Friday and Saturday also out of the 3rd place.
 
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Remember the objections to the comparison to the 2012 and 2014 routes before the race?
I didn't get them back then either. Especially the similarity to 2012 is so obvious (though I think both this route and this Giro are slightly better).

My hope is that Landa will have enough of this and attack on Kolovrat on Friday. He definitely has the team to do so. If Carapaz and Hindley follow they will be isolated much further from the finish than usually and if they don't they will be forced to stop looking at each other. My fear is that Landa doesn't want to risk falling off the podium while Hindley will just wait for Fedaia to make his attack there. I honestly don't think he has a very good chance of dropping Carapaz that way, but I feel like if he planned to be more aggressive we would have seen that already.
 
I didn't get them back then either. Especially the similarity to 2012 is so obvious (though I think both this route and this Giro are slightly better).

My hope is that Landa will have enough of this and attack on Kolovrat on Friday. He definitely has the team to do so. If Carapaz and Hindley follow they will be isolated much further from the finish than usually and if they don't they will be forced to stop looking at each other. My fear is that Landa doesn't want to risk falling off the podium while Hindley will just wait for Fedaia to make his attack there. I honestly don't think he has a very good chance of dropping Carapaz that way, but I feel like if he planned to be more aggressive we would have seen that already.
Carapaz is quite careful in not making himself exposed to an attack by Hindley, so unfortunately it makes sense for the latter to wait for and go all in on Fedaia. It's the tragedy of the route and a field that is quite even uphill.