Re:
RedheadDane said:
Have to admit I was a bit disappointed when Dideriksen wasn't picked to ride for Boels Dolmans, but I guess as a 19-year-old neo-pro that wasn't really to be expected.
Also with Leth being out injured (and Hitec not racing the Giro anyway) it's a shame but no Danish presence. In fairness though, Dideriksen is on one of the major teams because she's a quality prospect, but that means they don't have to sacrifice her; some of the smaller teams are sending young neo-pros to the Giro because they lack the same depth as Boels, Rabo or Velocio, and they're suffering like anything out there. That's why when Rabo took a 19yo neo-pro last year it was so surprising, but she acquitted herself exceedingly well thanks to great climbing talent.
Speaking of climbing, today it was Aprica, a mythical mountain of the Giro of course, albeit perhaps the easiest of all mythical climbs when not paired with the monolithic Mortirolo. The forecast in the posts above was that we'd see small gaps and a sprint of the elites, and so it proved.
We saw plenty of attacks on the final climb, as many strong climbers sought to push things on. The first move from a real quality climber was from Tetiana Riabchenko on the early steeper ramps, but she couldn't get more than a 15-20" lead for the first half of the climb, which was wiped out by the characteristically aggressive Claudia Lichtenberg, but with 6km to go the Boels domestiques pulled the 2009 Giro winner back. Orica's Katrin Garfoot, who came as their main GC threat but lost time to San Fior and is some way down on the GC, was next to try, but she had Rabo-Liv's Anouska Koster as an anchor, with Rabo having two riders in the top 10 behind. They were joined by Wiggle's Mayuko Hagiwara, the Japanese national champion being one of the climbing domestiques par excellence in the peloton, but a lack of co-ordination led to their move also failing (much to Hagiwara's exasperation). With Boels annulling any and all attempts to make strong GC moves, it fell to World Champion Pauline Ferrand-Prévot to make the late move in the rain to open up a small gap, but for a rider of her calibre a small gap is all that she needs, and she took the kind of slightly uphill single-second gap victory in the rainbow stripes that just drives home quality. Pauline brought home the victory after Francesca Cauz attacked late on to try to gain back in the mountains some of the time lost earlier in the race - she's a pure climber, but also to date rather a one-hit wonder, having had a stupendous Giro in 2013 but a bit of a horror show last year. She, like a good Italian pure climber, attacked solo, and PFP went across to her; she fought back to the World Champion's wheel once, but the second time on the finishing straight she had no answer and was eventually swallowed by the remains of the péloton, so will have to leave it to the next two days for her next bid to win her time back.
The GC at the top end didn't really change much; the group at the front was 40-strong and while a few people lost time, Rossella Ratto is perhaps the only one who you might not have expected to lose time today or who might have had reasonable GC interest. However, the uphill sprint suited Guarnier to a tee, and she and Anna van der Breggen nicked a few bonus seconds at the line to stand them in good stead ahead of the mountainous days to come. It was Rabo frenzy up at the front but realistically we can expect Brand to fade from contention in the days to come and de Jong has already lost plenty of time. The other three look pretty ominous for the opposition, however...
1 Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Rabo-Liv) FRA 3'16'28
2 Megan Guarnier (Boels-Dolmans) USA +1"
3 Anna van der Breggen (Rabo-Liv) NED +1"
4 Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Rabo-Liv) POL +1"
5 Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio (Bigla) RSA +1"
6 Alena Amialiusik (Velocio-SRAM) BLR +1"
7 Lucinda Brand (Rabo-Liv) NED +1"
8 Sabrina Stultiens (Team Liv-Plantur) NED +1"
9 Thalita de Jong (Rabo-Liv) NED +1"
10 Flavia Oliveira (Alé-Cipollini) BRA +1"
New GC:
1 Megan Guarnier (Boels-Dolmans) USA 15'10'07
2 Anna van der Breggen (Rabo-Liv) NED +5"
3 Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio (Bigla) RSA +12"
4 Lucinda Brand (Rabo-Liv) NED +19"
5 Elisa Longo Borghini (Wiggle-Honda) ITA +20"
6 Evelyn Stevens (Boels-Dolmans) USA +22"
7 Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Rabo-Liv) POL +24"
8 Karol-Ann Canuel (Velocio-SRAM) CAN +31"
9 Mara Abbott (Wiggle-Honda) USA +46"
10 Elena Cecchini (Lotto-Soudal) ITA +46"
Lichtenberg is at 1'01", Ferrand-Prévot at 1'55, van Vleuten at 2'00, Amialiusik at 2'09, Riabchenko at 2'17, Cauz at 2'25.