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Published on Friday, 28 May 2021 23:42

Giro d'Italia St 20

Verbania - Alpe Motta

Saturday 29th May, 164kms 

What a brute they have lined up for the final test of the climbers endurance. A flat opening 80kms, where they cross in to Switzerland, then straight up for the next 26kms to the top of the Bernardino Pass.  

The stage starts in Verbania, home of Filippo Ganna, and although he might like the opening 80kms, he won't like the final 86kms! They might only start climbing with 86kms to go, but in those 86kms they pick up over 4,300m of vertical gain!

The first two climbs go over 2,000m and the final climb, although only going up to 1,723m is a new climb for the Giro and looks tough with sections around 10%. All in all though, the three climbs are pretty steady and look well suited to the GC leaders' team keeping a steady pace, letting the break fight out the win and keep things under control ahead of the final TT. 

Stage 19 review

Short review, and apologies for the late pubishing of the preview, been a hell of a day running between two hospitals and only sitting down now at 22.45 to tap out my thoughts. Good day today, great winner in Yates, and we landed the 1-2 in the right order with Almeida chasing him home to land 9pts profit. Matchbets cancelled each other out, I underestimated just how bad Carthy has become this week, he finished almost a minute down on Vlasov who had a mini revival today. 

Bernal did what he had to do, he ground out the stage and desperately clung on in there, and in fact, he did pretty well. He was 3rd home, building on his lead over Caruso and limiting his losses to 28" to Yates, when it looked at one point like it could balloon. The KOM is still up for grabs, although Bouchard has a commanding lead, if Bernal has been saving himself for a monster ride tomorrow, he just needs 60pts of the 120 available to take the jersey. Dan Martin isn't without a chance either, he is 97pts behind, he needs to get in the break, without Bouchard, and take the 40pts on the first two climbs and then at least 2nd place on the final climb to take the 18pts to secure the jersey. A big ask, but not out of the question either!

The Route

A trip in to Switzerland on the final day in the mountains, they head north-east out of Verbania and run along the shore of Lake Maggiore, crossing the border after just over 20kms. The road is flat until about 60kms gone, when it starts to gradually climb up the valley. The road starts to get much steeper though after 80kms as they start on the Bernardino Pass, the longest climb of the race at 30kms in length. 

It goes up pretty steadily at a gradient of around 8% for 13kms, then flattens for 3kms before kicking up again for the next 6kms to the top around 7.4% average. 20kms of a descent and back climbing again, this time it's the Splugenpass, another Cat 8 that averages 7.3% for 9kms, but is 8.3% for the last 4kms. The Splugenpass has only every been used once before by the Giro, back in 1965, given its height let's hope it's passable and not covered in snow!

Once they pass over the top they are back in Italy and there's only 29kms of road racing left in the 2021 Giro. 21kms of that is a descent off the Splugenpass, and the remaining 8kms are the climb to Alpe Motta, a final Cat 1 of the race. The Motta averages 7.8%, but there's a flat section for a kilometre just 2kms from the top, making the true average closer to 9%. 

Contenders

When I looked at this first I thought maybe that this could be yet another stage for the break.. The Ineos boys will be happy to let a break go and build a big lead, they will be happy if they take all the bonus seconds on offer. Then, if the attacks come on the climbs they will have saved energy to hunt the attacks of Yates down, or at least limit the time gains. 

Break candidates - going to stick to the guys who are showing good legs and rode well today and have nothing to lose going out and giving it all on this final day. Koen Bouwman, keeps trying, tried to get in the break today, but missed, but then rode to 8th on the stage, towing Foss to the finish. He showed he has great legs on the climbs lately, Foss is almost guaranteed a top 10 so Koen might be let go, he has Bennett to look after Foss if needs be, Koen seems to have better legs. 

Diego Ulissi did ok today, but was no match for the GC guys on the final climb this time. Tomorrow's final climb isn't the hardest and might suit him if he's with the right sort of guys. Felix Grosschartner has been getting in breaks that haven't worked out and seems to be getting stronger as the race goes on, he was 18th today and arguably tomorrow's stage suits him more. 

And Dan Martin - I think he will try again tomorrow, he did sit in today and didn't even try to get in a break, and still rode to a fine 6th place, almost unseen by the cameras as they focused on the first three home. Dan could go in the break, he could attack on the final climb solo if Yates tries early and is reeled in and has nothing left for the final climb, or he could go with Yates when he attacks and possibly outsprint him for the stage win. Dan is a fighter and he might even have that KOM on he back of his mind, if he gets in the break and Bouchard isn't there (he's getting very tired now), then it's game on, he could take all three climbs and his break partners might just let him take the first two and fight it out on the last climb for the stage. 

But I was also thinking earlier this week when I first started writing my thoughts on this stage, after Bernal's demolition job on the Cima Coppi stage that he would probably love to win this one. It's the final big stage of the race and if he's feeling good he might want to go out there and win it like a champion. Filippo Ganna is from the town they start in, he'll probably smash it for the opening 80kms in to the base of the first climb and then let his mates lead Bernal over the next three climbs to take the stage win and the KOM to reward him for all the hard work he's done over the 3 weeks!

Add in that the intermediate sprint after 17kms might keep the race together until it's passed and the break are not left with a lot of space to build up a big lead ahead of the climbing. Depending on whether BEX and DQS decide to tear it up again, the break could well be kept within 2-3 minutes like today and wound in half way up the San Barnardino. 

I was thinking I wouldn't be surprised to see Bernal go from far out and really try to crown his Giro win with a spectacular long-range solo effort. From the top of the first climb there is just 60kms to the finish, 40kms of which are descending. But that was before the Bernal we've seen over the last two days, and unless it's all some big game they're playing and he's bluffing, it's hard to see him do anything other than ride as steady as he can and keep the time loss to a minimum. 

Yates was good today, but not super-good. He accelrated away more or less where I thought he would, and it was his better ability over the steeper gradients that kept Almeida at bay, like I thought it would. The final climb tomorrow isn't the hardest, but there is a kilometre with 6kms to go that hits over 10%, and that's where he has to go again. Almeida might well catch him when it eases back to 7.7 and 8.7% over the next 2kms, but if he keeps something back he can kick again on that 9.7% section with 2kms to go and kick on to win the stage. 

But on the other hand, he kicked, got a gap, but then couldn't extend it - and in the end, he saw his lead cut to 11" from 25" in the last 3kms by Almeida who never gave up again. We've seen a similar pattern the day before when he accelerated, got a gap to Bernal, didn't couldn't really extend it by much and Almeida rode away from him on the easier gradients near the top. The last km here is 7.1%, not quite as easy as two days ago, but it could give Almeida the chance to come back at Yates and maybe take the stage win off him. 

Caruso, Carthy, Vlasov, Bardet - of them, Vlasov might have got over his bad day and could go well again, Carthy just seems to be going backwards, and Bardet might have a chance if he attacks at the top of the Splugenpass and then hammers it down the descent to try to get an advantage ahead of the final climb, he'd be one of the best descenders of that lot. 

So as much as I'd like to stick with Yates tomorrow, I think Almeida might get a richly-deserved stage win for what he's had to put up with in this Giro. He should be fighting for podium here, if he hadn't lost so much time on one stage, he could well be riding to victory in the TT on Sunday.

But that's bike racing, and he'll learn a lot from this Giro and come back stronger. Yates should do enough to follow him home and he could jump above Caruso in to 2nd place, but Bernal should be able to limit his losses to around a minute again and go in to the final TT knowing that he probably has enough of a buffer to hang on and win. So close with Yates, but no cigar, that little drip-drip of time losses in the first week and a half have cost him this Giro.  

Recommendations:

2pts win on Joao Almeida at 7/2 with Unibet/Betway and 2pts place at 9/10 with Unibet

0.5pts win on Koen Bouwman at 18/1 with 365

0.25pts win on Diego Ulissi at 40/1 with Unibet

0.25pts win on Felix Grosschartner at 150/1 with 365

 0.5pts e/w on Dan Martin at 14/1 with Betway

Matchbets

Bernal over Caruso, Vlasov over Carthy and Bouwman over Bennett - 2pts at 21/10 with Unibet (Boosted)

Covi to beat Mollema - 3pts at 4/5 Covi seems to be going well at the moment, Mollema isn't, and the interview with him before today's stage suggested that he's not happy with his form and hasn't much left in the legs.