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Published on Thursday, 18 May 2017 00:12

Giro d'Italia St 14

Castellania - Sant. di Oropa

Saturday 20th May, 131kms 

A stage start with a nod to Fausto Coppi in his town of Castellania, and a stage finish on the legendary climb of Oropa, made mostly famous of course by Marco Pantani with his mythical win in 1999.

If you have never seen this win, take ten minutes to watch this video. I won't spoil it for you if you haven't seen it before, but take note of what is happening at the start of the video..

Of course we know now he was doped up to the eyeballs, but what an astonishing stage it was to watch at the time, and it still is a jaw-dropping spectacle to watch today. The way he scythes through the field is incredible, he passes back markers doing about 10kmph faster than them. 

Of course the climb has featured more recently in the race than 1999, with a superb stage back in 2014 that was won by Enrico Battaglin, riding for Bardiani at the time. It was a very different stage that day though, with a Cat 1 and a Cat 2 climb along the way before Oropa. A break of 21 riders got away and stayed away, with Cataldo finishing 2nd , Pantano 3rd, a 22 year-old Jan Polanc in 4th and Roche in 5th. It looked like Cataldo had it with 100m to go but Battaglin came from 3rd to pass him with just 25m to go for a brilliant win. Behind, Pozzovivo attacked and was marked by Quintana, Quintana eventually dropping him a little and finishing 4" ahead of him , Pozzo coming home with Aru. 

It has been a finish in the Giro five times in total, with the last time before Battaglin's win being in 2007, when it actually was a mountain time trial won by Marzio Bruseghin, from Piepoli and Di Luca.  

So it's going to be a special day on Oropa, on the centenary version of the race, with it being a Saturday the roads are sure to be packed full of fans like that day in 1999. And they will all be hoping they see a repeat of an Italian victory on this mythical mountain, a Nibali win would send them in to raptures, but the Tifosi would settle for any local taking the stage. It's a very short stage at just 131kms, it's sure to be explosive!

It was another sprinting masterclass from Fernando Gaviria today, this was his best win of the four by a long shot. Where he came from with 100m to win was simply sensational and broke the heart of Sam Bennett once again, who must have thought he had his first stage win with 50m to go and no-one around him. But the speed at which Gav came up the inside of Richeze and flew past Bennett was astonishing, you could almost see Bennett's heart breaking.. I really feel for him, Bora did a brilliant job today, far better than yesterday, they actually had 3 guys with Bennett inside the last 500m, with even Postlberger going off the front in an effort to make Richeze chase him down. They delivered him perfect, he hit the front, but alas, had to settle for 2nd again. 

Jasper Stuyven held off Ferrari who was sprinting with Modolo, who finished 7th, Ryan Gibbons had another superb result in 5th and Ewan came a cropper by bumping in to Richeze, but he was beaten anyway, he has no power left from what I can see. André Greipel finished 9th but Marezcko had a tougher run today and only finished in 13th, I put the curse on him. The big news, if you could call it big news really, is that Geraint Thomas succumbed to his injuries and went home this morning. Astonishing that he pulled off the best TT of his career on Tuesday then abandons today, but the knee injury he suffered has been getting worse as the week went on apparently. 

The Route

One of those L-Shaped routes that is big ring for 90% of the route and then a sudden, brutal change in gear and cadence as they hit Oropa. The stage starts in Castellania, birthplace of Fausto Coppi, and after a small descent for the first 8kms in the neutralised section, the race starts proper in Carbonara Scrivia. The next 120kms is fast-running and perfectly flat for 120 km, across the Po Valley.

Then, with around 28kms to go the road starts to climb, gently at first for 16kms or so, but with 11kms to go they hit the Oropa, which averages 7%, but hits gradients of up to 13%. Oropa will be this year's Montagna Pantanii, a prize awarded in Pantani's memory. The final 11-km stretch, climbing all the way to the sanctuary (five times a finish town and KOM), begins just past Biella. The gradient is low in the first part, up to Favaro, but it reaches its steepest gradient (around 13%) across the cobbles-paved center of Favaro, and then continues with several bends and a gradient around 9%, up to the 130-m long home stretch, on 6.5-m wide, cobbled road.

As you can see in the Pantani video above it's a pretty steady gradient the whole way up, he rode it in a pretty big gear, not quite the big ring, but probably in a 15 or 16 tooth at the back, definitely wasn't up in the 20s!

Contenders and Favourites

A race of two halves - you will need to be a strong rouleur to go in this break, and hope that you build up enough of a lead to last that last 12kms when it goes vertical on the map. But the climb, as mythical and difficult as is looks on the profile, is not that hard actually, certainly compared to some other famous climbs. The first 5kms average just 4% and can be probably done in the big ring for most strong guys pushing hard at the front. The last 6kms are a bit harder, averaging 7.9% and it undulates quite a bit as you can see in the last kms profile and map above.. 

The section starts with a hard 9.6% average for 1km and from the 6.7 to 3.2kms to go points it averages 8.9%. There's a false flat with 1600m to go for 500m for a bit of brief respite, then 700m at 7.4%, another short flat and then the last 130m to the line are 7% again, to that famous wide road Pantani celebrated on with arms open wide.

Does the break have any chance? Yes, I think it has a small chance - but it needs several things to go right for it. It needs to maybe go early - the earlier the better. The sooner the peloton downs tools and sits up and allows them to build up a big lead the better. If they race the first hour at over 50kms an hour trying to get a break going, then there will be only 80kms or so left to build up a big lead and it may not be enough to hang on. Also, it needs the right number of guys, 8-10 is plenty, any more and there will be passengers and lack of cooperation. And they need some strong rouleurs in there - if it's a group made up of just climbers, they won't build up a big enough lead possibly.

They also need the peloton to take it steady - GC teams will probably not be too interested in ripping it all the way to Oropa, and although some might fancy winning such a monumental stage in the race, they may not want to waste too much energy, they'll need it for the climb. One other thing to consider that is both a plus and a minus for the break - they will have a 10mph headwind all day, not very strong, but still energy sapping.. It will of course hamper the break a little, but also, there may not be great interest from other teams to spend all day pulling at the front in the wind. It will be worth bearing in mind too that the wind will be in their faces most of the way up the climb, but luckily they are protected for a lot of it by the hill and trees.  

But the incentive to win on a stage like this will be strong for some of the GC candidates, especially the Italians like Nibali and Pozzovivo, so it's going to be interesting to see if they work hard to try to pull it back together, or will they just let the break go and fight out the stage from a GC point of view. We've seen that scenario all too often lately with GC men seemingly indifferent to the stage honours, it's all about the GC. 

As I mentioned above, this is a very different stage to the one that finished here in 2014, it's just one long drag strip until the sudden explosive kick-up at the finish, so it's doubtful we'll get a break like we did that day that was full of climbers. The break will go of course, and it could be a real battle to get in it as there is the faint hope that they might stay away and contest the finish. It will be interesting to see if Enrico Battaglin will be allowed go now that Kruijswijk is 12th and over 6 mins back. It depends on whether they think fighting for a top 10 is worth it and still support him all the way to Milan or whether they say 'fuck it, let's go for stages'. And that goes for all the LottoNL guys, not just Battaglin. But with history on this mountain and a great finishing kick, Battaglin may well almost feel obliged to try to get up the road. 

Jan Polanc was 4th the last time up here, just 17" behind Battaglin, and is climbing very well in this race too. He's 18th in the GC though and may well just decide to try to ride for as high a GC placing as possible for now and see what happens next week if he slips back further. If the GC men pull in the break half way up the climb though he might have a go, he won't be marked as closely as others and he could get the likes of Rolland or Costa go with him in a small group that could pull out a gap that holds to the line if the GC men look at each other a bit too much. 

Rui Costa is one I like the look of here too based on the form he showed on stage 10, he seemed to get better as the stage went on, seemingly struggling at times, but finishing very strongly, he was very unlucky not to win the stage. He can possibly attack late, he can possibly win an uphill sprint from a GC group. Pierre Rolland is sure to give it a go too, but we all know that he's probably going to get caught. But with the first World Tour win coming for Cannondale in 737 days with Talansky's win in the ATOC on Thursday night, there might be extra pep in the Argyle steps. 

Cannondale might also send Hugh Carthy or Davide Villella up in the break too, both would have a good chance if it's a select group that fight out the finish, both are good climbers. Sky might also send the likes of Philip Deignan up the road again, he was on the attack a few days ago but was pulled back to look after Thomas. Kenny Elissonde or Diego Rosa could go too, but I've a feeling they might wait for the hillier stages next week.  

It's not a great day for the KOM candidates, with just one climb, but it is a Cat 1 climb with lots of points on offer and Omar Fraile's sure to be tempted by a big attack low down on the climb here. He looked fantastic on stage 11. Not only did he spend the whole day more or less attacking, he came out of nowhere to take the KOM points off of Rolland on the final climb and had the strength to still win the sprint in the end. He will have a little freedom to attack as he is so far down, he may well be marked by Polanc and Rolland and they could form a strong little group that might go on the steepest parts with about 6kms to go. And judging by the sprint he showed when he won, you'd fancy him to take the stage against most guys. 

Another rider who could fancy an attack around this point too, and might even kick things off, is Mikel Landa, especially now that he doesn't have to look after Thomas any more. The steep parts around 9% are perfect for him to launch a blistering attack. He rode very well on stage 11 too but just ran out of gas near the end. With a few rest days in his legs now he is sure to be refreshed and feeling better and ready for another go. He too will be given some rope and is the kind of guy that can pull out 30" very quickly. And as there is literally only about 6kms of climbing for him he'll be fresh and ready to go. 

If it comes down to a GC battle, then of course Nairo Quintana will probably win it.. probably.. all depends on how hard he wants to go tomorrow, to maybe take 30" or less. The easier gradient in the last 3-4kms means that the likes of Dumoulin, Mollema, Nibali and Pinot will be able to grind it out behind him and limit their losses I think. But every second counts for Nairo now, he knows he probably needs to make up 4-5 minutes on Dumoulin ahead of the final TT, so why not chip away with 30" and the 10" bonus? The steep kilometre or so with 2.5kms to go could be his attacking point, or he could even start a lot earlier, as soon as it starts hitting those 8, 9 and 10% gradients with 6kms to go. Expect Anacona and the rest to absolutely rip it to pieces up the first 5kms to thin things out and put the other team's helpers under pressure. Then Quintana can be free to fly. 

Thibaut Pinot is riding really well as well though, he will like this sort of finish, he can get in to a good rhythm and can attack away when it eases back a bit in the last 1500m. If they have not let Quintana go, and there's a GC sprint, I think he has a good chance of taking the stage from the sprint. He has made it no secret that Pantani was an inspiration and a hero to him so he is sure to put in a big effort tomorrow. 

How will Tom Dumoulin fare tomorrow in his next test of this winner credentials? Well I think he will do ok and not lose too much time. The climb is too short to really to lose a lot of time, I can't see him cracking badly. He will maybe lost 20-30 seconds to Quintana if he goes hard in the last 2-3kms, but he won't crack. And if the pace isn't furious he may even be able to stay with a lead group if Quintana can't get away. But he won't be winning a sprint finish in this lot and he won't be able to attack away from them either I think. 

Bauke Mollema is an interesting one, he has, as always seems to be the way, ridden under the raydar up until now, but he sits happily in 3rd place in the GC. He's unlikely to attack away to win it, he's not that punchy, but he's also unlikely to win a sprint either. But he's riding very strong and may be someone that can stay with Nairo for quite a while, or at least come home with someone like Pinot in a top 3 place. 

And what about Adam Yates? Held up in the motorbike crash, he lost a lot of time then, but pulled off a pretty excellent TT in the next stage. He finished comfortably with the Quintana group in Bagno di Romano and could be ready to try to get some time back here. He could try a late attack, he could be a top contender in a group sprint of the favourites. 

Vincenzo Nibali is riding really well at the moment too and threw a few shapes on the last climb on stage 11. He is sure to try to get away, the crowd and Italian TV will go bananas, but he will fade and get caught again without winning it. Ilnur Zakarin is one that could try a late attack too, we've already seen that on Etna, but he did lose a little time on stage 9 to Blockhaus, he doesn't seem to be firing on all cylinders. Domenico Pozzovivo could go very well here too, the gradient really suits him and he seems to be recapturing his form from before his big crash in 2015. I think he could be one to back in the 4th to 9th market with Bet365 in-play. Davide Formolo and Bob Jungels should be there or thereabouts too, it's unlikely they will lose a lot of time here, Formolo could be a wild outsider if he was given some room, but I don't think they willl

So I think this is going to be a real race of two halves.. nothing worth watching in the first two and a half hours, then an explosive last hour or so as they start climbing. I am hoping we get an attack from the guys just outside the favourites, such as Rui Costa and Mikel Landa, but if it comes to the GC men, I think Quintana will prove too good for them again, but Pinot can chase him home, or if on a really good day, stay with him and outsprint him. 

Recommendations:

0.5pts each-way on Rui Costa at 40/1 with Bet365

0.5pts each-way on Mikel Landa at 16/1 with 365

3pts win on Nairo Quintana at 2/1 with Betfair

Back Pinot in the 1st to 3rd market in play tomorrow if it looks like it will be the GC men fighting it out, should be around evens to 6/4 I'd say. 2pts on that.  

Back Pozzovivo to finish 4th to 9th in same situation as above. 2pts on that too. 

0.25pts each-way on Jan Polanc at 80/1 with 365

0.15pts each-way on Enrico Battaglin at 125/1 with 365

Matchbets: 

Maxime Monfort to beat Ben Hermans - 2pts at 5/4

Pozzovivo to beat Zakarin - 3pts at 4/6

Yates to beat Nibali - 2pts at 6/5, all with 365