Giro d'Italia Giro d'Italia 2025 stage 20: Verrès – Sestrière, 205 km

[Libertine Seguros]

G. Thomas lost the 2023 Giro by not attacking Roglic when it was clear he was struggling.

In fact, the day Rogic lost time, it was because Almeida attacked. If it were up to G., Roglic wouldn't even lose time that day.

Giving advice is a very human trait, but taking it isn't. It's probably a lot easier for him to spot those opportunities from afar, besides Thomas is a notoriously cautious rider within the bunch when it comes to time gains. Based on the body of work we have available to us, we can surmise that he may have managed the game better had he been in del Toro's shoes, but he'd never have even considered taking the risk had he been in Yates' ones.

 

[Brullnux]

Giving advice is a very human trait, but taking it isn't. It's probably a lot easier for him to spot those opportunities from afar, besides Thomas is a notoriously cautious rider within the bunch when it comes to time gains. Based on the body of work we have available to us, we can surmise that he may have managed the game better had he been in del Toro's shoes, but he'd never have even considered taking the risk had he been in Yates' ones.

Thomas in Yates' place would've protected his podium; Thomas in Del Toro's place would have probably won the Giro, or at least lost it to Carapaz.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Thomas in Yates' place would've protected his podium; Thomas in Del Toro's place would have probably won the Giro, or at least lost it to Carapaz.

But then again Thomas would never have been in Del Toro's place because it would have required him riding an aggressive, crash-free sterrato stage.

 

[Cycling111]

@Rackham

The GTs that Roglic has won have been because of his watts, because he was superior to his rivals.
And many of his stage wins are due to being the strongest in a hill sprint.

Cycling is an endurance sport, especially GT races.
There are exceptions, but it's a sport in which the strongest have been won 90% of the time at GT.

By the way, Yates was the strongest yesterday.
Derek Gee also rode at his own pace and took almost three minutes longer to climb Finestre. It´s what it is.

The best in history have been so for that reason.
Roglic does not hold the shared Vuelta record for another reason.

 

[Rackham]

@Rackham

The GTs that Roglic has won have been because of his watts, because he was superior to his rivals.
And many of his stage wins are due to being the strongest in a hill sprint.

Cycling is an endurance sport, especially GT races.
There are exceptions, but it's a sport in which the strongest have been won 90% of the time at GT.

By the way, Yates was the strongest yesterday.
Derek Gee also rode at his own pace and took almost three minutes longer to climb Finestre. It´s what it is.

I don't know why you're mentioning Rog but if you're inclined to go there you could say he won 3/5 of his GT's with "watts". The Vuelta 2020 meanwhile was only won with his superior punch versus Carapaz (4 stage wins versus none for Carapaz + a little Movistar assistance on Covatilla...) because he was cooked after the Tour whilst the Giro 2023 was won with sheer grit and determination to hold on whilst injured and then do a super performance on Monte Lussari when it mattered.

But Rog is something else as well: he's smart and a good tactician when it matters. Something Del Toro was absolutely not yesterday. Generally speaking riders who don't exist head and shoulders above everyone else (like Rog) need to develop those tactical skills to win because being a brute isn't enough.

 

[Eyeballs Out]

Carapaz did the right thing if he wanted to win the Giro and not ride for secondary placements. He just didn't have the legs.

I completely agreed with him / EF being prepared to sacrifice 2nd place for the chance of winning. It made a refreshing change to see a team do this. However, I felt they were far too impatient and not just with the initial launch. Yates with a gap was actually a good situation for Carapaz if he's going to play poker, but in order to win, Carapaz needed to persuade del Toro to ride a strong pace for at least 30 mins in pursuit of Yates while he sat on. IdT was never going to do that while Carapaz was repeatedly attacking him.

 

[Savant12]

I can understand why Carapaz and Del Toro did what they did. Perhaps, they underestimated how good Simon Yates was feeling. And Simon Yates was incredibly positioned in 3rd place as it put Carapaz or Del Toro in a true lose/lose position if one couldn't drop the other after Yates went.

Simon Yates was unstoppable yesterday, the way he closed down the gap to those two was amazing and then that attack towards the motos was Contador-esque. He knew he had the legs to ride away and even without WVA waiting up, I still think he would have won as Carapaz and Del Toro would mark each other out.

 

[Gigs_98]

Has someone checked on @Gigs_98. Is he even alive?

Btw, regarding this, yes I actually missed the stage and only watched it today in the morning. Still got it

 

[Red Rick]

Btw, regarding this, yes I actually missed the stage and only watched it today in the morning. Still got it

Your contribution and sacrifices for cycling fans worldwide shall not be forgotten, good sir.

 

[Rule #9 apostle]

Thomas in Yates' place would've protected his podium; Thomas in Del Toro's place would have probably won the Giro, or at least lost it to Carapaz.

Honestly find it very difficult to see any way del toro could have won yesterday from being isolated with two better climbers rolling attacks on him from the bottom of the finestre. He decided not to let the closest guy and presumed best climber carapaz go, and he just about manages to hang on to him. I think thats the right bet, only problem was yates was too strong

Of course it looks bad when he does not pull over the top but with wout ahead jersey is already lost by then.

 

[Red Rick]

Honestly find it very difficult to see any way del toro could have won yesterday from being isolated with two better climbers rolling attacks on him from the bottom of the finestre. He decided not to let the closest guy and presumed best climber carapaz go, and he just about manages to hang on to him. I think thats the right bet, only problem was yates was too strong

Of course it looks bad when he does not pull over the top but with wout ahead jersey is already lost by then.

Well, it's likely he loses anyway becuase it looked to me like Yates was just the strongest. But that doesn't mean he's excempt from criticism for making really big mistakes in a really big moment.

 

[Sciatic]

It levelled the playing field because Dried De Bondt pulled for Carapaz and Del Toro with his own version of "I don't know why he did it".

Stuff like that must confuse neophytes who've never really watched a bike race before. I hear lamentations along the lines of "But why?".

Answer? Who the hell knows. Friendships, loyalties, enemies, backhanders, favors, whatever. Welcome to cycling.

I always find those incredibly interesting moments. Sometimes it's explainable--like when they are countrymen, or a long-time former teammate. Or in the case of Contador's final epic win, it was honoring the king (or wanting to be part of history). But I don't know motivated those riders yesterday.

 

[Sciatic]

That was afterwards, when the "calf had already drowned" as we say in Dutch. Watch it back, Carapaz was almost on Yates' wheel and then Mosca came to the rescue. De Bondt pulled when Yates was already quite a bit ahead.

Interesting. However, it seemed pretty apparent Yates would just keep up those attacks until the same result happened.

 

[Sciatic]

Who knows. We can only speculate. It can be as nefarious as some people want to imagine or conversely totally benign, like maybe Simon Yates was nice to Mosca once-upon-a-time during a stage and he thought why not return the favor.

Not to say this is what happened but I remember a story Luke Rowe once related in which during some smaller race he helped pace Patrick Gamper back into the breakaway after he was dropped. Something for which Gamper showed gratitude for by gifting a plate of goodies a few days later to the Ineos guys.

The only way to prevent the sort of stuff we saw yesterday on Finestre from happening would be for commissaires to intervene if the rider dropped from the breakaway paces a rider from another team for no reason (especially a GC rider fighting for the overall). But how would you police that? It's almost impossible.

Why would you want to police it? The instances like yesterday happen rarely and have minor impact. And also, at least for me, demonstrate that cycling isn't completely an automaton sport. And the "assists" yesterday are de minimis actions compared to entire teams chasing down riders out of spite (Movistar several years ago), or national allegiances we used to see more of in the past.

 

[Sciatic]

Carapaz's attitude has been so praisedm and UAE's poor performance has been so criticized, that it has gone unnoticed that Carapaz's attack is a serious mistake. Because he attacked as if Simon were five minutes away from him. The reality is that Simon was at the same distance from Carapaz as Carapaz was from Del Toro.

True. But it makes sense (from his and his team's perspective) that his eyes were focused forward rather than behind as they approached the decisive moments.

 

[Escarabajo]

Carapaz's attitude has been so praisedm and UAE's poor performance has been so criticized, that it has gone unnoticed that Carapaz's attack is a serious mistake. Because he attacked as if Simon were five minutes away from him. The reality is that Simon was at the same distance from Carapaz as Carapaz was from Del Toro.

People have mentioned countless times that EF and Carapaz's strategy was a mistake. The problem is that it has been overshadowed by Del Toro's behavior. At some point Carapaz lost the race and it was up to Del Toro to pick up the flag, but He (UAE, whatever) didn't want to do it.

 

[Sciatic]

Very much inline with your POV after having watched 2nd time. Watching it first time EF's looked like waste, but my thought was they would still be overwhelmed by UAE at Finistre. Your point about Carapaz, however, using way too much foolish energy at plenty kilometres runup before his attack from the bottom of the monster climb, I agree completely. Acting like superman about to crunch evil forces.

I can see all of that. But regardless of strategy and conservation of his resources, I don't see how he takes back 40" or whatever it was yesterday, given what both he and Del Toro had in their legs. Yes, he could have stayed ahead of Yates, but why would that matter to him?

 

[Libertine Seguros]

As an obvious example, Alberto Contador gifted Paolo Tiralongo - a former teammate of his - his first career win in the 2011 Giro. Paolo Tiralongo, having been in the breakaway that day before the Saxo raid, helped pace Contador on his Fuente Dé raid a year and a half later. Nevermind that Tiralongo would have acquired that stage win in retrospect with Contador's removal later, he wouldn't have got to raise his hands in celebration on home turf. Yes, he later won another Giro stage, but at the time he was an 11-year pro without a single career win to his name who had just been caught in the final kilometre by a guy who was already dominating the race.

Oftentimes money changes hands, favours are promised to be cashed in in future, or are dealt out by the team car (take for example the 2010 Tour stage over Madeleine, where riders in the breakaway were instructed not to interfere with Jérôme Pineau's KOM points collection to ensure a Frenchman wore a jersey into Bastille Day - the fact that Anthony Charteau took pains to roll over second behind him played a key role in his winning the polka dots over Christophe Moreau, also in the break that day, who tried to contest the jersey but was not allowed up the road in the queen stage due to RadioShack and Caisse d'Épargne duelling over the Teams Classification). Or sometimes it's just spite - Movistar chasing down Carapaz in 2020 to ensure Roglič stayed ahead in a message to Acquadro about his bad faith dealings that had alienated them at the time, for example - or David Millar bewailing that the péloton usually didn't respond to a Garmin rider going up the road in 2009-11 but if it was him the break would usually be doomed. Or Fabian Cancellara doing a huge turn on the front to pull back a break only 200m from the line. for no sprinter in particular, in the 2013 Vuelta solely because he was very petty about Tony Martin being better than him at that point in time.

 

[AnotherArmChair]

Of course one has to ask the question if Carapaz had not attacked at the bottom of the Finestre what would Yates have done.. Rode at a high pace and dropped del Toro on the Finestre ?

I think Yates was great yesterday but I dont think Carapz was much weaker if at all. He just tired himself out with explosive attacks and couldnt catch Yates who also had WVA and he may or may not have needed him but the psychological advantage was immense

So if Carapaz had not attacked he and yates may have dropped del Toro and then he could have stay on Yates and won ?

Of course this is speculation and it was Simon Yates time and he deserved it but I think Carapaz was very strong too . The 3 main protagonists were very well matched in strength but not in style and that was what made the race so unpredictable

 

[Sciatic]

The problem is that with the increasing Premier Leagueification and the concentration of such a large number of the strongest riders into the same few teams, the isolation happens less frequently, hence the (often kinda doomer) perception of it all being a watts game. Not exactly helped by many riders holding and propagating the belief that essentially all they need to do is the bicycle equivalent of point and squirt driving and any crashes or incidents that occur as a product of this are the organiser's fault (hi Matteo!).

You've mentioned this several times over the past few years, and it helped me understand something else, that is why we get such weak breaks in the sprint stages during the1st week or 2 of GTs; weaker pro-conti (or whatever they are called now) rosters and strong superteams that can dictate who they allow up the road.

 

[Sciatic]

Giving advice is a very human trait, but taking it isn't. It's probably a lot easier for him to spot those opportunities from afar, besides Thomas is a notoriously cautious rider within the bunch when it comes to time gains. Based on the body of work we have available to us, we can surmise that he may have managed the game better had he been in del Toro's shoes, but he'd never have even considered taking the risk had he been in Yates' ones.

!! Never heard that before. So true

 

[Sciatic]

Your contribution and sacrifices for cycling fans worldwide shall not be forgotten, good sir.

The legend continues

 

[Sciatic]

Honestly find it very difficult to see any way del toro could have won yesterday from being isolated with two better climbers rolling attacks on him from the bottom of the finestre. He decided not to let the closest guy and presumed best climber carapaz go, and he just about manages to hang on to him. I think thats the right bet, only problem was yates was too strong

Of course it looks bad when he does not pull over the top but with wout ahead jersey is already lost by then.

There became a point when he absolutely needed to realize the danger and change his focus, which was obvious to most everyone watching. Hard to put too much blame on a rider who is hanging on for dear life and exhausted after 3 weeks. But that puts the onus on the team car to do everything possible to insist he change his focus, even if they had to drive right up alongside him to urge him on.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

You've mentioned this several times over the past few years, and it helped me understand something else, that is why we get such weak breaks in the sprint stages during the1st week or 2 of GTs; weaker pro-conti (or whatever they are called now) rosters and strong superteams that can dictate who they allow up the road.

Not only that, but with the increased number of guaranteed invites and the fewer wildcards and local-interest teams in the biggest races, the value of break of the day exploits and staying out there longest and battling for a stage win is eroded, we hardly even have any teams which live on getting the sponsors airtime that way. Exacerbated of course by the higher quality of teams chasing, due to the concentration of the best riders into a smaller number of teams, meaning the break often doesn't get the chance to build up a big enough advantage to viably believe they can stay away.

 

[Sciatic]

Not only that, but with the increased number of guaranteed invites and the fewer wildcards and local-interest teams in the biggest races, the value of break of the day exploits and staying out there longest and battling for a stage win is eroded, we hardly even have any teams which live on getting the sponsors airtime that way. Exacerbated of course by the higher quality of teams chasing, due to the concentration of the best riders into a smaller number of teams, meaning the break often doesn't get the chance to build up a big enough advantage to viably believe they can stay away.

Probably doesn't make a big impact on the overall race, but it definitely takes away some of the enjoyment for those of us who like watching (at least portions of) the earlier portions of flat sprint stages.