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Giro d'Italia 2023 Giro d'Italia, Stage 13: Borgofranco d’Ivrea – Crans Montana, 199 km (Friday, May 19th)

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So G came 4th and 9th
 
I thought it was a rather nice breakaway stage. An over-the-top battle between Pinot and Cepeda topped off by a courageous Rubio that had the third-best legs and was clearly burned out by being in the break the previous day. A hard-won win by a rider who risked losing the stage but saved all his matches to have a shot at being there for a sprint which he would have had a very tough time winning. But Cepeda went gone from too far out and Pinot followed allowing Einer to win a 600m climby-boy sprint he had no business contesting much less winning. But that's cycling for you.

And to top it off we saw Bahrain give it a proper go and a vintage Gerraint Thomas last km attack surely just to test some legs and an Almeida finish line sprint. Not bad for the first mountain stage of the second week.
 
Adam Hansen

@HansenAdam

I will speak out and defend the riders for the dry roads. First, we were told stage 10 we could not negotiate just before the start when the weather is most accurate. 20 guys went home in a 24-hour period. We were told we can not negotiate days in advance because the weather can change. So we did it the day before, and the prediction was much worse. We did it then because we had no alternative. We also agreed to stick to it.
Professionals operate with several scenarios when the future is uncertain. They make conditional plans.

IF the weather is bad enough, then this is our demand.

IF the weather is not bad enough, then we'll race it as is.
 
Not unexpected the lack of action today: When you backload a GT as much as the Giro is doing, then you go into a stage like today with such a tight GC. AND you then have to cut more than half the stage, and end have a rather easy final climb.. Absolutely normal what happened today. Roglic has no interest getting rosa now, attacks are hard on a climb like this. This stage could be great action if on top of the Croix de Coeur the selection is already big. Which wasn't going to happen most likely with the shortened stage, even with the normal one with this GC situation.. Now if Evenepoel was in rosa with 2' and his team still not performing, then we might have seen something, but like this? This was the more expected and logical way.

As for what happened in front, Rubio wasn't trolling, he was suffering, it's Cepeda who stopped collaborating in the flat. Rubio did what he had to do. If Pinot and Cepeda continue for once it's rather unlikely that Rubio manages to come back.