Arnaud Démare won stage 4 of the Giro. As one of the strongest sprinters he took the opportunity to take home the first bunch sprint. After Bora accelarated in the climb sprinters like Viviani and Gaviria (the latter definetely) were dropped, the descent had splits with Trek in front but no-one pushed the pace hard, in the end it came to a fairly big bunch sprint where Groupama and Israel led the final kilometers, the end was an exciting photo-finish sprint between the winner Démare just beating Sagan and Ballerini.
Positive: Démare will ride with little pressure now that he's gotten his win, Sagan and Ballerini though both looked really good!
Negative: Thomas abandoned the race after it was revealed he has a broken pelvis, Gaviria couldn't make it back to the peloton after several of his teammates burnt themselves in the chase.
The Route
Stage 5 is the begining of the race in mainland Italy through the Calabria region and what a brute it is. It may not look like it for some but there's 4700 meters of climbing on this day, there's 225 kilometers and a whole lot of uncategorized climbing throughout the day.
The quite long climb that summits near the finish Valico di Montescuro, 23 kilometers in lenght and an average of 6% is a true mountain on the end of a hard stage, it summits with 11.6Km and antecedes a descent finish that will motivate the riders that feel good into trying. So early on the race after a time-trial, two hilly stages and Etna, this is another day that can make big damage in the GC riders.
The descent into the finish is quite technical as you can see, even the final kilometers although on flat roads comes up with some nasty corners near the finish.
The Weather
Harsh harsh day. One for the tough men, it will be a very long day in the sadlle in cold and rainy conditions, the first hour of racing will be quite dangerous as there will be strong crosswinds in the first section of the stage. For most of the stage it's a moderate southwestern wind, which matches with a tailwind in the final climb. Attacks are written all over it, it will be a very interesting day!
The Favourites
This is a rough day, one for a breakaway? Well I didn't think it'd happen on Etna but it did, it's a brutal day tomorrow though and I will point out some names, however I don't believe the breakaway can succeed. AG2R has come, Hakkinen/Peintre/Bidard/Bouchard will for sure try something, Movistar have Villela and Cataldo, EF have Guerreiro, these are some of the riders that I like if they get in the break tomorrow. Also Diego Ulissi woudn't be a bold call as he's targeting the points and has been saving his legs.
However the likely scenario is a battle between the GC riders, but as we've seen in Etna that's a very open battle, just how it should be!!! There are two riders that in my opinion have the shared best chances to win this race which are Vincenzo Nibali and Steven Kruijswijk. In Etna I was expecting them to loose time to some of their main rivals, but as Thomas crashed out and Yates had a bad day they have remained with the main bulk of riders and haven't lost big time to anyone, as they are riders who usually peak in the third week they will be riding conservatively whilst the pressure is in others. Nibali himself will love the rainy and long day, just how he likes them whilst Kruijswijk should be the opposite.
These are the two men to beat, on the attacking side I'd put in three names that will try to attack and be agressive. Wilco Kelderman who had a "silent" (aka no TV cameras with him) ride in Etna gaining time on the Nibali group and has a strong mountain team, Rafal Majka who clearly had intentions in Etna putting his team to work, with Patrick Konrad not spending bullets tomorrow could be different. The other is obviously Jakob Fuglsang, it's unsure how he'll fare with the third week so for now I think he'll try to take the opportunities to take some time on his rivals if he can, despite having his team severely hampered.
As for outsiders they also come aplenty, young Harm Vanhoucke was the fastest rider up the Etna which is impressive and right now we're in the unknown with him really, I am however excited to see what he can do, Pello Bilbao and Herman Pernsteiner are leading Bahrain's tilt so far, Deceuninck have here a climb that I reckon suits João Almeida well and Fausto Masnada aswell as it's a relatively constant climb they can do something good tomorrow, opposite is on Domenico Pozzovivo who prefers harder gradients, however he's a good rider for mountain slogs (appropriate for third week) and tomorrow's long mountain could suit him though. As the climb isn't that steep there could be some space for other names to appear who have had a bad day in Etna, Simon Yates is the obvious name as he'll try to get his legs back and if he goes well, try to start recovering his lost time.
Prediction Time
⭐ Bilbao, Almeida, Konrad, Pedrero, Guerreiro, Bouchard, Ulissi
Actually, I changed my mind! It's a hard day, not one that suits a breakaway that much, but at the same time I don't think any team will really commit to chasing until the final climb. The start is slightly uphill so there could be some good riders attacking off the start. Can I be wrong? Maybe, but my call for tomorrow is Geoffrey Bouchard.
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