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Published on Friday, 07 May 2021 17:04

Giro d'Italia St 1  

Turin - Turin

Saturday 8th May, 8.6kms    

The Giro marks the 160th anniversary of the unification of Italy with a TT around the streets of Turin, where the first meeting of the Italian parliament took place in 1861. Turin also held a TT in 2011 to celebrate the 150th anniversary, but that year it was a team time trial, won by HTC-Colombia.  

That stage win for HTC put Italian Marco Pinotti in to the Maglia Rosa, and this time around the organisers seem to be wanting a similar outcome, putting on a TT that looks to be perfectly suited to Italian TT specialist, Filippo Ganna. But after winning eight TTs in a row, Ganna has now lost two in a row he has started as favourite for, so can he regain his mojo in this one?

The Route

The course takes place entirely within the city, in fact in a very tight area of the city. They start in the magnificent Piazzo Castello, cut through the Giardini Reali before turning sharp right and head down the Corso S. Maurizio. After 1.5kms they turn sharp right again to head along the Lungo Po Cardona alongside the river Po. along the Corso Cairoli and enter the Parco Del Valentino after 2.5kms. 

1km later they pass the intermediate time check at the Borgo Medievale del Valentino, then carry on through the park, out the other side, do a little loop around in a u shape and head across the Po on the Ponte Isabella. Then a sharp right, followed by a two more sharp rights as they take in another loop around the Piazza Zara, but once they straighten up with just under 3kms to go, it's more or less straight all the way along the Corso Casale to the finish line at the Church of Gran Madre de Dio. No gain in altitude, hardly any complications bar some rough road surfaces, one for the TT experts to go full gas on. 

Contenders and Favourites

So it looks like a three horse race, with Ganna, Cavagna and Evenepoel miles clear of the rest, according to the odds. Hard to argue with it really, especially with the first two, Evenepoel no one knows what sort of form he will bring. But if he's in great shape, then he will be challenging. 

Filippo Ganna won the first TT of his season at the Etoile de Besseges, but looking back at it, we should have seen that all was not as it should be with Ganna, as he won by just 10" from Benjamin Thomas, with Ethan Hayter just 21" back. He should have won that by 30" plus against that field. 

He did better in the UAE TT, beating Bisegger by 14", but then suffered a shock in Tirreno, when something like the 2/5 favourite, losing to Wout by 6" and Kung by 11". That was over 10kms, this is 8.6kms. Then in Romandie, just last week he was hammered in the 16km TT, finishing 37" behind Cavagna, and was even beaten by Van Wilder, Cattaneo and Soler. Soler?!

He had been working for Thomas in the days leading up to it, and the course didn't really suit him - that climb on the cobbles at the start really killed him. He was only 17th fastest at the intermediate split, 20" down on Cavagna, but was able to make up some ground in the latter part, moving up to 10th, but still finished 37" down on Cavagna, so he didn't actually pull back any time, in fact, he kept losing it.

His average speed over the second part of the course was 55.72kmph, compared to 56.52kmph for Cavagna, that's almost a second faster per kilometre on the roads that *should* have favoured Ganna more. Only Bissegger went faster than Cavagna in the second part, where his lower CDA kicked in, but he'd lost the TT on the cobbled climb too, he was 17" slower than Cavagna to T1. Interestingly, Andrey Amador was also quicker than Ganna in the second part, doing it at 55.94kmph. 

Remi Cavagna was superb in that TT though and made a mockery of the odds of 9.4 I got on him on Betfair that morning, a nice little boost to the coffers ahead of the Giro! His first TT of the year in Paris Nice be lost to Bissegger by less than a second, which was super disappointing as I had had a good word for him and his chances in it.

That was over 14.4kms, that course had a steep hill for 300m after 1.7kms and a steep kick up at the finish for 400m. He was 3" down at the first split, but improved in the second part again to take it back to less than a second. He had the fastest T1-Finish time, but interestingly, only 0.5" faster than Paddy Bevin who jumped from 25th to 10th from 1st splt to finish. 

So basically, Cavagna has been getting quicker and better in the last month or so, whereas Ganna has been getting worse! This TT course is pan-flat though, so will it swing back to Ganna's favour again, versus courses with a bit of a hill where Remi seems to to better? Will home advantage help Pippo? Maybe, but if the legs haven't got it, it doesn't matter where he is riding. 

Ganna was imperious though last year, winning all three TTs in the Giro, and a road stage for good measure. He won the opening 15km by 22" from Almeida, helped by the design of that course with an 8km downhill, perfect for him pushing huge watts through a 56 tooth big ring. In the second TT, only Rohan Dennis was able to come within a minute of his time over the 34km rolling course and in the final, flat 15km TT Campanaerts and Dennis were closest, but still 32" behind him. An annihilation again. He also took the Italian TT title, World Title and the TT in Tirreno.

In the flat world's course, Cavagna was only 7th, 48" behind him, Wout Van Aert was closest, 26" down, maybe Cavagna hadn't recovered fully from the Tour, and maybe home advantage favoured Ganna a bit at Imola that day! After his win in Romandie, Remi said that he 'gave it 200% and I got a result that gives me a huge boost of confidence ahead of the Giro where I have some personal goals, but I also want to help the team'. He also added that "the parcours didn't really suit me, as it had some technical parts and steep sections. The next target is the Giro, the prologue. It suits me better than today's course, so it's encouraging"

He also has ambitions to win the TT at the worlds and the Olympics, so he'll be giving this 100% to see where he's at versus his biggest rival for those.  

Then we have Evenepoel. What do we make of him? Ignoring all that happened and the fact that he's coming back after a nine-month layoff, would we have him as joint second favourite, not far off Ganna in the betting? Well, just look back to Jan 2020 and the 15km flat TT in San Juan - Evenepoel won it by a massive 32" from Ganna, with the third placed rider 1'08" back. In the Tour of Romandie TT in 2019 over a flattish 17kms, Ganna finished 3rd, 15" behind Roglic, with Evenepoel 38" further back in 15th. 

In Harrogate for the 2019 World's Evenepoel beat Ganna by 46" over the 54km course to take 2nd behind Dennis and in the 2019 Euros, over 22kms, Evenepoel won it with Ganna down in 6th, 23" down.. So 19/20 year old Evenepoel was smashing TTs, beating Ganna in some, but Ganna had his share of success too. 

So what do we do? Well, I personally think Cavagna has the edge now on Ganna, both in terms of the power he's putting out (faster on the flatter part of the last TT) and his confidence. Ganna's confidence will have taken quite a knock over the last two defeats, and he'll also feel the pressure of riding at 'home'. I also think that he will have the edge over his team-mate simply down to 'race fitness', so the 5/2 - 11/4 that's available on him looks good to me. 

So who else can get involved? Victor Campanaerts used to be pretty good, now he's not that hot.. simple as that.. 30th in the TT in Paris Nice, not a great result, all the talk was about how he changed his training schedule to become more of a classics rider.. not that it did much for him, a few flashes at the front in a few races is all we got from him. He was closest to Ganna in the final TT last year though in the Giro, finishing ahead of Dennis by fractions of a second, but was only 36th in the opening TT, over a minute behind Ganna. He doesn't seem to start GTs very well and for that reason and the fact he seems to have shifted away from TTs a bit this year I can't have him. 

Joao Almeida won't be far off his two team-mates, and if Ganna has an off day we could even see a DQS 1-2-3.. He will be going hard to gain time on all his GC rivals, but I don't think it will be enough to beat the top 2 or 3. In Catalunya over 18kms he was 28" behind Dennis and 23" behind Remi, I think we could see him make the top 5 or 6, but about 12-15" behind the winner. 

I mentioned above that Patrick Bevin did almost the same as Cavagna in that TT in Paris Nice, it was hillier than this, but that's mighty impressive. 4th in the Worlds TT in 2019, behind Dennis, Evenepoel and Ganna, if he repeats that tomorrow he could well finish in the top 3. At 11/2 for a place he's worth a nibble, and the 3/5 to beat Tratnik also appeals, he should take him.

Alberto Bettiol did a really good TT in Tirreno this year, just 7" behind Ganna in 6th place, 18" behind WVA and ahead of Almeida, Hepburn, Thomas and Tratnik. He had just come back from altitude and I think he might even be in better shape now for this after a break since the spring classics. He won the TT in Etoile de Besseges last year too over 10.7kms so he likes short TTs, I think he's well capable of a top 10 but 1.33 is too short.

An odds-against shot for the top 10 though is Nelson Oliveira, I think he is capable of doing it, has had plenty top 10s in his career in TTs and a good TT could see him move in to the top 2 or 3 after stage 4. And that's about it - Moscon, Affini, Foss and Walscheid should go well and might break in the top 10, but they won't be troubling the podium

So Cavagna for me, no big stakes on each bet though, but a few bets that will hopefully get us off to a good start. 

UPDATE: 11:35am - I've been told this morning that Jos Van Emden was sick at the UAE Tour and that's why he didn't do a great time, finished 8" behind Brandle. He apparently really likes the course and says that his legs were good in Romandie, he's hoping for a good spin today. He is 11/10 with Betway to beat Brandle and that's worth adding. 

Recommendations:

2pts on Remi Cavagna at 3.8 on Betfair or 3.5 with various

1pt on Patrick Bevin to finish in the top 3 at 11/2 with Unibet

2pts on Nelson Oliveira to finish in the top 10 at 2.1 with Betway

Matchbets

2.5pts on Bevin to beat Tratnik at 3/5 with Unibet

Bevin to beat Dowsett and Oliveira to beat LL Sanchez - 2pts at evens 

Ganna to beat Evenepoel - 2pts at 4/6

3pts on Van Emden to beat Brandle at 11/10 with Betway