Giro d'Italia 2020, stage 15: Rivolto - Piancavallo 185 km

[gunara]

Welcome to 2020, where NTT and Sunweb are mentioned as the strongest GC teams in a GT.

I faintly remembered the cries in this forum for Skill-Shimano got "too much love" from GT organizer giving them wild card. Few years later you still could find Degenkolb climbing with their newly-found GC pretender.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Shoutout to the 2017 Piancavallo stage, one of the most WTF stages I've seen.

Also shoutout to the 2011 Piancavallo stage, which was one of the best stages I've seen.

Piancavallo 2011?

 

[Red Rick]

He did 57 TT's in his professional career and never finished outside the top 30. He's no specialist, but i wouldn't exactly say he's a horrible TT'er.

You're looking at procyclingstats? It doesn't seem to list ITTs where he didn't get points for whatever points system it has. It doesn't have the stage 1 ITT of this year for example. 30th place is simply the cutoff points for getting points in PCS.

 

[Red Rick]

Piancavallo 2011?

First climb of the Gardecchia stage.

 

[Keram]

NTT will drill it then Pozzovivo will atack for a microsecond. We will argue here if it was attack or not and then someone will use this and attack for real.

I hope some domestics will be send to early break. Sagan should go and then push for Majka before last climb. But I think FDJ will be against this plan. Could be interesting stage.

And there is also Ronde. I realized as I am writing this. S**t this will be busy Sunday. Last week I followed Gent closely and skipped Giro but this one could be good.

 

[Rollthedice]

First climb of the Gardecchia stage.

The stage where Nibali lost another Giro which he couldn't have won anyway on the road but could have had his name on the trofeo instead of Scarponi which in the end wouldn't have been nice anyway.

 

[Red Rick]

The stage where Nibali lost another Giro which he couldn't have won anyway on the road but could have had his name on the trofeo instead of Scarponi which in the end wouldn't have been nice anyway.

I don't really know how much energy he wasted. IIRC it wasn't that much?

 

[Leinster]

I used hate TTs but tomorrow is what they are for. Some riders have to attack now

The problem comes when the best TT rider has the best climbing train and kills all opportunities of attack.

Kelderman and Almeida are the best TTers of the GC contenders and have the best groups of climbers in the race, but not so strong that they’ll be able to negate every attack that comes from all the others. Hopefully.

 

[Rollthedice]

I don't really know how much energy he wasted. IIRC it wasn't that much?

Maybe if he just rides to protect his second place and not go loco on the descent of Passo Giau he wouldn't have lost a minute and a half to Scarponi in the end.

 

[SafeBet]

He did 57 TT's in his professional career and never finished outside the top 30. He's no specialist, but i wouldn't exactly say he's a horrible TT'er.

He finished 100th on his very last ITT before today.

 

[Red Rick]

Maybe if he just rides to protect his second place and not go loco on the descent of Passo Giau he wouldn't have lost a minute and a half to Scarponi in the end.

Wasn't that much work was it. He was going nowhere, then got dropped on Fedaia, then closed almost a minute in that descent.

He just timed his 2 worst days that race really poorly.

 

[repre]

Almeida's coronation as the next Caparaz will begin tomorrow.

 

[perico]

McNulty lost ~40 seconds on Etna to the GC contenders, not sure if he has any chance to hang on tomorrow.

You’d be surprised. It was his 1st mtn stage in a GT and he may have been hesitant to go deep. Now that he’s in a real position to finish in the Top 5, he may find that extra gear. The kid was supposed to be a real prodigy coming up under Roy Knickman’s development, and had some insane test results. He has super talent, no doubt. At one point, his coaches stated that he was more physiologically gifted than LeMond. It hasn’t really translates to success on the road yet though. I always thought Costa was more gifted personally.

Here is the article where it’s stated.

Why Brandon McNulty chose to race in the U.S., not Europe – VeloNews.com

Brandon McNulty, one of America’s next great cyclists, has chosen to race with the Rally team in America instead of in Europe. Why?

www.velonews.com

 

[Anybody_but..]

As of today he is.

Apparently Konrad has just become Majka's helper but still one is from AUT, another POL - both in GER team.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

He finished 100th on his very last ITT before today.

Yeah, i just remembered why i though PCS was a crap site. In their overview they only list the races where the riders score points according to their point system. Meaning, everything outside top 30 isn't even listed

 

[Carols]

Maybe if he just rides to protect his second place and not go loco on the descent of Passo Giau he wouldn't have lost a minute and a half to Scarponi in the end.

We love him because he Doesn't ride to preserve second!

 

[Leinster]

Almeida's coronation as the next Caparaz will begin tomorrow.

Ineos will make a rest-day announcement that he’s Bernal’s newest domestique?

 

[repre]

Ineos will make a rest-day announcement that he’s Bernal’s newest domestique?

That would be downgrade from his career of being Remco's oldest domestique

 

[ciranda]

I consider Fulgsang a horrible TTer so his poor result was expected. Am I wrong?

Yeah this was unusually bad. Last year he was 9th in Dauphine, 12th Tour de France in stages with similar length and difficulty.

 

[Leinster]

That would be downgrade from his career of being Remco's oldest domestique

Still, anything is better than being Movistar’s latest co-leader.

 

[Danskebjerge]

I've never seen Fuglsang make a comeback in a GT, so I would be (pleasantly) surprised to see him do anything spectacular that really makes a difference.

On the other hand, it could be a chance to lose a lot of time regarding a later attempt to win a stage, but it's a bit late in the race for that kind of maneuvre.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

On the other hand, it could be a chance to lose a lot of time regarding a later attempt to win a stage, but it's a bit late in the race for that kind of maneuvre.

Considering that the hardest days are still to come, I wouldn't call it too late yet. There are both stages and a possible KoM to go for.
But it all depends on tomorrow's outcome. He's only two minutes off the podium, so isn't over yet. But as you rightly mention, a comeback like that, would be a first for him.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Without that time lost, he'd have been 8th today in GC. Against what is hardly a stacked field of competitors.

And Thomas, Yates and Kruijswijk (3 of the 4 pre-race favourites) out.

 

[Tonton]

Largely forgotten thing about that 2017 Piancavallo stage was that the race was actually all over the place with 100k to go as the peloton split on a descent and Dumoulin was caught behind. There was a long chase between the groups and Dumoulin himself had to start working to catch them on a 2nd category climb with 90 k to go but was lucky the front group had run out of domestiques and Quintana, Nibali, Pinot and most other gc guys weren't daring to go on a 90 km break without any teammates.

Then Dumoulin dropped pretty much at the beginning of Piancavallo but Quintana and Nibali were so bad they got dropped by Pinot, Zakkarin and Pozzovivo while barely gaining a minute on Dumoulin.

Yeah, that stage was weird.

IIRC, that's the stage when Pinot attacked, Pozzo and Zak went away when Nibali and Quintana did nothing, hoping that Dumourain would do the job. Dumo put a few digs to show them that he had strength, stopped his effort, later unleashed in the media, hoping that they would lose the podium, calling Nairo and Vinnie wussies. And for the second day, Il Grandissimo Tibopino took time back, which he needed after a terrible stage 16, a.k.a. the poop stage.

 

[HelloDolly]

I've never seen Fuglsang make a comeback in a GT, so I would be (pleasantly) surprised to see him do anything spectacular that really makes a difference.

On the other hand, it could be a chance to lose a lot of time regarding a later attempt to win a stage, but it's a bit late in the race for that kind of maneuvre.

And people on here used to ridicule Richie Porte's supporters when they neverlost the faith ...Richie a man though who could always climb and time trial with the best but this believe in Fuglsang is sheer madness

If he cant beat this field he needs to never utter the words 'riding for GC' again