Warning: due to cowardness from Giro organizers (despite heroic attempts to prevent this from happening from the brave Angelo Zomegnan) the race will not take its anticipated course.
The events in the following 2 posts are therefore purely fictitious.
____________________________________
150 years in the making
The day is almost upon us. One of the hardest profiles in Grand tour history.
We should perhaps start by giving a warm Giro welcome to the Crostis.
Every grand tour has its mega climbs, the ones that stand head and shoulders above the rest.
The Giro has the Passo di Mortirolo, the Tour has Mont Ventoux. The Giro has the Passo di Stelvio, the Vuelta has Angrilu. The Giro has the Colle delle Finestre, The Giro has the Monte Zoncolan. Now the Giro has The Monte Crostis.
The stage starts in Austria. The words “mini tour of Lombardy” were used to describe stage 5, but they are just as useful to describe the first 140km here. In fact throughout the stage it is difficult to even find a flat section.
At the 27.8 km mark, comes the riders first challenge. Though 400m will have already been climbed by then, the riders will have to show their faces to Italian border police making sure Alejandro Valverde isn’t hiding in the pack as the race crosses back into Italy.
Starting at 685 m altitude, The peloton will pass the Passo di Monte Coroce Comellico having already climbed to 1636m and go down to as little as 375m at Villa Santina. In between they will pass the 9 k at 5% Passo della Mauria, and the 4k at 6% Passo di Santantonio together with various other uncategorised climbs, while the 6k at 7% climb to Avaglo, comes minutes before the start of festivities in Ovaro.
Then the race hits the Crostis.
yes that really is the Crostis and not a random mountain.
First into the firing line will be the breakaway, hopefully containing one or two good climbers, perhaps Sella. And boy will this be exciting. You’ve never seen a breakaway disintegrate so quickly as will happen on Saturday when they hit this beast.
The climb starts at 7.2 % for the first km. About the average gradient for a proper hc tdf climb of this length.
The gradient never gets this low again.
It then hits double figures at just over 10% for the second km and then hovers in and around the mid 9’s for the next 3.
Any attacks now would struggle to get answered but might be suicidal considering whats to come. But even that is just a warm up for the next section.
Km 5 to 6 is 11.2 and 6 to 7 is 10.1 % At this point the break will have ceased to exist as a unit. Its protagonists likely skattered across the road for km’s. Anyone feeling the slightest weakness in the pack will be unable to hide it. This isn’t etna were you can hide behind the next guy and get a small draft. The rider in front of you will drop you without knowing it. But its only the half way mark.
A short restbite at 9.2 is followed 12.7. and 11.2 for km 9 and 10. Some will likely struggle to stay on their bike.
If the preceeding 8km had somehow failed to do the trick, these 2km are Zomegnan saying to the riders, “ you are going to make this stage epic one way or another”.
But the riders wont be hearing anything as their bodies will be screaming in pain. Their legs struggling to fuction, their lungs gasping for air, the brain struggling to think with the lack of blood.
Some might suggest that people might be scared to attack on the Crostis because of whats to come. While that may happen the thing about the Crostis is that its so hard, you can drop people without knowing it. At that pace, theres practically no slipstream. Remember how the organizers let people ride behind one another in the Kronplatz tt because theres no drag. Well this one has even less drag. The race essentially becomes 150 time trials at once. Oh and did I mention that much of it is unpaved.
The final km lets the riders see the top of the climb, and a generous dive back into single figures, helps the riders a bit as they triumphantly cross the banner.
A fascinating end to what surely will have been an epic stage.
Right?
The events in the following 2 posts are therefore purely fictitious.
____________________________________
150 years in the making
The day is almost upon us. One of the hardest profiles in Grand tour history.
We should perhaps start by giving a warm Giro welcome to the Crostis.
Every grand tour has its mega climbs, the ones that stand head and shoulders above the rest.
The Giro has the Passo di Mortirolo, the Tour has Mont Ventoux. The Giro has the Passo di Stelvio, the Vuelta has Angrilu. The Giro has the Colle delle Finestre, The Giro has the Monte Zoncolan. Now the Giro has The Monte Crostis.
The stage starts in Austria. The words “mini tour of Lombardy” were used to describe stage 5, but they are just as useful to describe the first 140km here. In fact throughout the stage it is difficult to even find a flat section.
At the 27.8 km mark, comes the riders first challenge. Though 400m will have already been climbed by then, the riders will have to show their faces to Italian border police making sure Alejandro Valverde isn’t hiding in the pack as the race crosses back into Italy.
Starting at 685 m altitude, The peloton will pass the Passo di Monte Coroce Comellico having already climbed to 1636m and go down to as little as 375m at Villa Santina. In between they will pass the 9 k at 5% Passo della Mauria, and the 4k at 6% Passo di Santantonio together with various other uncategorised climbs, while the 6k at 7% climb to Avaglo, comes minutes before the start of festivities in Ovaro.
Then the race hits the Crostis.
yes that really is the Crostis and not a random mountain.
First into the firing line will be the breakaway, hopefully containing one or two good climbers, perhaps Sella. And boy will this be exciting. You’ve never seen a breakaway disintegrate so quickly as will happen on Saturday when they hit this beast.
The climb starts at 7.2 % for the first km. About the average gradient for a proper hc tdf climb of this length.
The gradient never gets this low again.
It then hits double figures at just over 10% for the second km and then hovers in and around the mid 9’s for the next 3.
Any attacks now would struggle to get answered but might be suicidal considering whats to come. But even that is just a warm up for the next section.
Km 5 to 6 is 11.2 and 6 to 7 is 10.1 % At this point the break will have ceased to exist as a unit. Its protagonists likely skattered across the road for km’s. Anyone feeling the slightest weakness in the pack will be unable to hide it. This isn’t etna were you can hide behind the next guy and get a small draft. The rider in front of you will drop you without knowing it. But its only the half way mark.
A short restbite at 9.2 is followed 12.7. and 11.2 for km 9 and 10. Some will likely struggle to stay on their bike.
If the preceeding 8km had somehow failed to do the trick, these 2km are Zomegnan saying to the riders, “ you are going to make this stage epic one way or another”.
But the riders wont be hearing anything as their bodies will be screaming in pain. Their legs struggling to fuction, their lungs gasping for air, the brain struggling to think with the lack of blood.
Some might suggest that people might be scared to attack on the Crostis because of whats to come. While that may happen the thing about the Crostis is that its so hard, you can drop people without knowing it. At that pace, theres practically no slipstream. Remember how the organizers let people ride behind one another in the Kronplatz tt because theres no drag. Well this one has even less drag. The race essentially becomes 150 time trials at once. Oh and did I mention that much of it is unpaved.
The final km lets the riders see the top of the climb, and a generous dive back into single figures, helps the riders a bit as they triumphantly cross the banner.
A fascinating end to what surely will have been an epic stage.
Right?
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