Giro 2017, Stage 6: Reggio Calabria-Terme Luigiane 217km

[SafeBet]

Today Petacchi said he managed to sprint with the punchers in 2003 only thanks to the "maglia rosa" effect. He doesn't believe the sprinter will survive this finale. Maybe Modolo in De Panne form, but I don't think it's likely.

 

[Sciocco]

Pozzovivo to attack hard for pink because next stage goes through his home town I believe.

 

[Jancouver]

Sagan FTW

If he was here ...

now I have to go Pinot or G

 

[staubsauger]

That moment when Piotr Wadecki looks at the roadbook and thinks: “Kurwa, we should've re-signed Rebellin!“ :lol:

 

[jaylew]

I see the break contesting this one.

 

[Robert5091]

Jungels to be there at the end - Rui Costa maybe for the win. GC teams will be going crazy at the end to stay on the front - hope all make it home!

 

[MightyWheelSucker]

Re:

That moment when Piotr Wadecki looks at the roadbook and thinks: “Kurwa, we should've re-signed Rebellin!“ :lol:

Rebellin was not allowed to ride Giro two years ago, if I remember correctly.

 

[carton]

Re: Re:

I'm going to go out a limb here, and assume you mean Adam...

Jasper to get some TV time either today or Sunday /predicting

 

[silvergrenade]

Jasper Stuyven to win!
Just because he's on my team.

 

[portugal11]

Big tom will destroy everyone

 

[Robert5091]

Two uphill sprint awards today? (According to Live Tracker)

 

[hammerthaim]

Hairpins mean punching it out of corners hmmm.... Would hate to be on this one. Hass to screed it up somehow ((presumably from not looking around in crosswinds to see how many people aren't in his wheel.) You know who you are.)) Forza Yatesy!

 

[tobydawq]

Re:

Today Petacchi said he managed to sprint with the punchers in 2003 only thanks to the "maglia rosa" effect. He doesn't believe the sprinter will survive this finale. Maybe Modolo in De Panne form, but I don't think it's likely.

The maglia rosa effect... What kind of argument is that?

Whichever shirt he was wearing, he did manage to come third. So it's not impossible for the stronger sprinters to be in the mix, and with Gaviria's focus on the maglia ciclamino i would expect him to try to keep up. I don't see him winning, though.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Today Petacchi said he managed to sprint with the punchers in 2003 only thanks to the "maglia rosa" effect. He doesn't believe the sprinter will survive this finale. Maybe Modolo in De Panne form, but I don't think it's likely.

The maglia rosa effect... What kind of argument is that?

Whichever shirt he was wearing, he did manage to come third. So it's not impossible for the stronger sprinters to be in the mix, and with Gaviria's focus on the maglia ciclamino i would expect him to try to keep up. I don't see him winning, though.

Let's not forget that was the year when Petacchi won 15 Grand Tour stages! Some of them were even medium mountain stages. He was absolutely incredible - possibly the greatest GT season by a sprinter that there has ever been. And the stage was over 70km shorter.

Sprinters (including Gaviria) only have an outside chance imo, if the peloton soft-pedals most of the day (which isn't that unlikely ), but even then, surely a breakaway will take it.

 

[tobydawq]

I agree with you but I was quite impressed by Gaviria's climbing on the Etna stage. He managed to sit in the front of the peloton until it was quite small without looking to be suffering too much until he soft-pedalled to the top. But I'm not giving him more than an outisde chance either.

And I must confess that I didn't have the opportunity to watch much more than the Tour back in the days so I probably do not have a very good perception of how big difficulties Petacchi managed to get over. But by the looks of things on the video and the result list, only 40-50 riders were still in the peloton at the bottom of the climb back in 2003, so it has to have been quite a hard stage too.

 

[Arredondo]

1. Montaguti
2. Haas
3. Pozzato

 

[tobydawq]

It's hard to look past Haas for the rider as the favorite but if it comes down to a sprint I would also think that this finale suits Enrico Battaglin very well. His stage victory in 2013 was on a finale like this (perhaps a little less steep) and even though it has been looking like a fluke, he has shown great potential for finishes like this by winning that stage. And so far he has been sprinting (albeit unsuccessfully) so he does have the green light from Kwuijswijk to try. If that is also the case for Gasparotto, he could be a danger man as well.

 

[starlord]

Pibernik for the second in a row!
But I'm gonna go with Gaviria, he might surprise us.

 

[ThePirate81]

Breakaway will take it imo. Haas,Battaglin,Stuyven,Gasparotto,Teuns and LLS are all far down already in the GC,and if they get in the break QS will not pull to bring them back.

 

[Flamin]

Don't think a break will make it. Long stage, barely any KOM points to win and multiple teams have someone who could win the stage from the bunch.

 

[Nirvana]

I don't think sprinters will be all ruled out, expecially if they don't go all out in the last bump before the short uphill finish.
I can see guys like Gaviria, Sbaragli, Bennati (if allowed) in the top 10.

Anyway i'll go with a break, with no strong favourites only Quick Step could try to control the race.

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Re:

It's hard to look past Haas for the rider as the favorite but if it comes down to a sprint I would also think that this finale suits Enrico Battaglin very well. His stage victory in 2013 was on a finale like this (perhaps a little less steep) and even though it has been looking like a fluke, he has shown great potential for finishes like this by winning that stage. And so far he has been sprinting (albeit unsuccessfully) so he does have the green light from Kwuijswijk to try. If that is also the case for Gasparotto, he could be a danger man as well.

You are right that Battaglin could be a candidate. I just think he's been fairly underwhelming this season. Even last season, when his climbing was great in the Giro, he was not really a factor in the kinds of finales like the one today. He did manage to finish in the top 10 twice thus far in this year's Giro, so maybe he will be more of of a factor today.

 

[ThePirate81]

Among the GC riders I think Dumoulin has a big chance to gain time on his rivals,he loves this kind of finales as Praia a Mare 2016 shows.

 

[Lexman]

stage has started, bunch has put on a high pace, difficult to escape, Stuyven, Postlberger and Pedersen try to get away

 

[Valv.Piti]

Not hoping that he break will make it unless its a huge one with pretty big names. I want to see the peloton and the best riders in the Giro duke it out in the finale, a very tricke one, with many possible winners! These stages are always great, the Giro of 2015 had a boatload of tem (many of tem harder).

On the other hand, I wouldnt mind too much that a break makes it and some of the riders take the Maglia Rosa with 5-10 minutes just to shake the race up a bit. It has been too stale so far this year, unfortunately - hopefully the good racing awaits on the mainland.