Isaac del Toro struck again within the battle for the Giro d’Italia maglia rosa and prolonged his race lead, profitable stage 17 to Bormio with a late assault 1.7km from the end.
The Mexican leapt clear from a choose group of GC favourites on the ultimate climb of the day at Le Motte, 9km from the end of the 155km stage, taking his most important GC rival Richard Carapaz (EF Training-EasyPost) with him.
The pair collected breakaway survivor Romain Bardet (Picnic-PostNL) on the largely downhill run to the road, taking turns to carry off the chasing group behind. It regarded as if the stage would culminate in a three-man dash to the road, however Del Toro had different concepts and put in a single final transfer to go clear on the streets of Bormio.
Carapaz didn’t have it in him to match the acceleration and shed 4 seconds – plus six bonus seconds – to the 21-year-old Mexican on the line as Bardet beat him to second place.
Additional again, Simon Yates (Visma-Lease A Bike) led dwelling the chase group at 15 seconds down, with Giulio Pellizzari (Pink Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Derek Gee (Israel-Premier Tech), and Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious) amongst these accompanying the Briton.
Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) got here dwelling within the subsequent group on the street, 1:10 down, whereas Michael Storer (Tudor) completed 4 minutes again. The large GC loser of the day, nevertheless, was Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious), who misplaced much more time after dropping on the stage’s massive climb, the Passo del Mortirolo.
Del Toro now continues within the race lead with an prolonged 41-second lead over new second-placed rider Carapaz. The EF rider jumps above Yates, who now lies third at 51 seconds down. Gee, mendacity in fourth, is the one different rider inside two minutes of the lead at 1:57 down.
The way it unfolded
Stage 17 Giro d’Italia: the peloton leaves the beginning city of San Michele all’Adige (Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
Stage 17 of the Giro d’Italia noticed the peloton proceed with one other difficult mountain stage, this time taking in 155km of racing between San Michele all’Adige and Bormio.
Three main climbs lay on the route – the second-category Passo del Tonale (15.2km at 6%), the first-category Passo del Mortirolo (12.6km at 7.6%), and the third-category Le Motte (3.1km at 8%), 9km from the end.
On a day doubtlessly suited to an enormous breakaway battle for the stage victory, it was no shock to see a mess of assaults fly. Riders together with Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease A Bike), and Mattia Cattaneo (Soudal-QuickStep) tried strikes through the rising opening 20km, however nothing bought away earlier than the intermediate dash at Cles at 23.5km.
There, Pedersen hit the entrance once more to beat Dries De Bondt (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) to the road and add one other 12 factors to his mammoth maglia ciclamino whole. The assaults continued shortly afterwards, with the street nonetheless rising in direction of the bottom of the Passo del Tonale.
Pedersen was on the transfer once more, this time accompanied by a bunch of others because the break lastly bought away. In whole, 39 riders made the transfer, with Brandon McNulty (UAE Group Emirates-XRG) simply the best-placed man on GC out entrance, the American mendacity 7:43 off the race lead.
Maglia azzurra Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS-Astana) was unsurprisingly within the group, as had been quite a few different robust climbers, together with Bardet, Steven Kruijswijk (Visma-Lease A Bike), Dani Martínez (Pink Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious), and Filippo Zana (Jayco-AlUla).
The peloton, other than Polti-VisitMalta, who had missed the transfer, was pleased with the composition of the group, and let the break journey three minutes up the street on the early slopes of the Tonale.
Up the street, the break rapidly blew aside on the climb, with an acceleration by Fortunato placing the weaker climbers out the rear earlier than the halfway level. Having cut up in half on the way in which up, round 25 males had been again on the entrance on the high of the climb.
Fortunato put in one other acceleration throughout the summit so as to add 18 factors to his KOM whole. With 337 factors on the board, he loved a large 212-point lead over Astana teammate Cristian Scaroni, whereas Juan Ayuso (UAE Group Emirates-XRG) lay in third with simply 54 factors.
(Picture credit score: Getty Photos)
On the way in which down, the break’s lead grew out to 4 minutes, with Visma-Lease A Bike’s climbers Kruijswijk, Bart Lemmen, and Wilco Kelderman main the way in which onto the fearsome Mortirolo.
The break, and the chasing peloton, rapidly shattered on the way in which up as the tough gradients bit. Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) and Thymen Arensman (Ineos Grenadiers) had been notable names dropping from the peloton through the early slopes of the climb with over 50km left to run.
On the entrance, Fortunato tried one other transfer halfway up the climb, although a counter-attack from Martínez proved stronger. The Colombian flew previous and established a 20-second lead earlier than he was joined by Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla) 4km from the highest.
Extra riders, together with Fortunato, Cattaneo, Bardet, McNulty, Efonso Eulálio (Bahrain Victorious), and Florian Stork (Tudor) got here throughout earlier than the summit, with Eulálio – responding to a transfer by Bardet – main the race excessive and going solo on the descent.
Again within the peloton, the GC motion was kicking off as Giulio Pellizzari (Pink Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) mounted the primary assault from the much-reduced group.
Riders together with race chief Isaac del Toro, Simon Yates (Visma-Lease A Bike), and Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) struggled to hold on, and had been put deeper in bother when Richard Carapaz (EF Training-EasyPost) launched a transfer of his personal near the summit.
The Ecuadorian’s assault noticed no response from behind, although he wouldn’t keep away for lengthy, whilst teammate Georg Steinhauser dropped again from the break to assist. Carapaz was introduced again to the GC group on the way in which down, the riders mendacity 2:30 from the entrance of the race heading into the ultimate 50km.
On the descent, issues got here again collectively on the entrance, with Eulalio caught again by the chasers. Bardet, Fortunato, Cattaneo, Kelderman, and Stork linked up with the Portuguese rider, with Mathias Vacek (Lidl-Trek) additionally coming throughout to make it an eight-man group.
Again within the GC group of 20 riders or so, the hole to the break solely diminished as UAE and Q36.5 put in work on the entrance. On the Pink Bull Kilometre is Le Prese, 25km from the road, it was all the way down to 1:40.
From there, UAE continued to push on in direction of Le Motte, shaving second after second from the breakaway’s benefit. On the climb itself, a brief however sharp check earlier than a downhill run to Bormio, they introduced it beneath 30 seconds.
Bardet put in a single last-ditch assault from the break as the rest of the transfer was introduced again by the GC males. Behind him, solely Cattaneo may maintain off the cost behind. He’d quickly be caught and handed, too, nevertheless, as Del Toro launched in direction of the highest of the climb.
The Mexican, responding to a transfer from Rubio, shot previous the Colombian, taking Carapaz with him because the pair left the remainder of the GC hopefuls of their mud, with Bernal and Pidcock having already dropped from the group.
Heading down the descent and into the ultimate 7km, the pair trailed Bardet by 10 seconds, however the hole was solely closing because the riders raced in direction of Bormio. At 5.5km to go, the Frenchman was caught earlier than latching onto the rear.
Again down the street, Yates, Pellizzari, Rubio, Eulalio, Caruso, and Gee chased with a 20-second deficit. They wouldn’t make it again to the leaders earlier than the road, although, and needed to struggle to the end to restrict their losses.
Del Toro and Carapaz regarded set to duke it out for the stage win, but it surely was the race chief who made the decisive transfer 1.7km from the road. He put in one other assault, this time on a descent, to catch Carapaz out and snatch treasured seconds, and a career-first Grand Tour stage victory in addition.
Outcomes
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