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Credit: Hadrian Chevalier
Nearly two years after it was run, Ivan Basso is now a podium finisher at the 2009 Giro d’Italia. Why? Italian rider Franco Pellizotti was today handed down a two year ban by the Court of Arbitration for Sport for having a Biological Passport profile that indicated blood doping. He was stripped of his 2009 results, which means that Basso now moves up to third. Interestingly, Basso only finished fifth at the finish of the Giro. However, Danilo di Luca, who finished second and Pellizotti, who finished third, have since been found guilty of doping. Carlos Sastre, who originally came fourth, can claim second spot.
Today’s ruling also means that Egoi Martinez is now the 2009 Tour de France King of the Mountains, another title Pellizotti claimed that year.
It’s happened before, as in the case of Floyd Landis, and it will no doubt happen again, but its still hard to get used to results being altered so long after the fact. Pellizotti’s case is nevertheless a big victory in efforts to stem doping in the sport. The Biological Passport is a relatively new development that doesn’t rely on testing for prohibited substances. Instead it monitors blood profiles, allowing for riders to be suspended if their profile changes unnaturally. His case was originally thrown out Italian Olympic Committee, who had decided there was insufficient evidence. The CAS thought differently.
If you ever wondered why Danilo Di Luca is nicknamed The Killer, one look at him today on the closing kilometres of the Blockhaus would put you in no doubt. Teeth clenched and wild eyed, he had all the look of a rampaging murderer. Di Luca was going at full gas, once again trying to seize this Giro by the sheer force of his own will.
Up the road was Franco Pellizotti of Liquigas, who after appearing dead and buried on Monday had attacked on the lower slopes in attempt to put himself back into the race. Behind him were several of his key rivals, including Pellizotti’s team mate Ivan Basso and Cervelo’s Carlos Sastre. And glued limpet-like to his wheel was race leader Denis Menchov, who held a slim 39 second advantage over him. Di Luca had to limit the time Pellizotti gained, increase his advantage over the chasing riders and somehow try to shake off Menchov. Such was the fierceness of his riding, that it was easy to believe he could accomplish all three, were it not for the the fact that Menchov appeared stony faced and unflappable as he tracked his rival to the top of the Blockhaus.
Di Luca has ridden this Giro the hard way, always at the front, always on the hunt for stage wins or podium positions to eek out those bonus seconds. He has appeared almost indestructible and it’s almost impossible to believe that a rider can go so hard for two and a half weeks and never show signs of cracking. Somehow he has.
Pellizotti though held on for his stage win and took 40 odd seconds from Di Luca and Menchov. It was good enough to put him put to third place overall, but not enough to really threaten the leading duo, since he finished the day a full two minutes behind Menchov in the overall. Pellizotti though made a serious statement today. While he was largely anonymous for the past few stages, his team mate Basso attacked twice and didn’t make much from it. When Pellizotti went today, he made it count.
If Pellizotti gained the most today, Carlos Sastre was the big loser, finishing 1:19 behind Menchov. Now back in fifth in the overall and 3:30 behind Menchov his slim chance of victory is more or less gone. Yet somehow this adds to Sastre’s appeal as a rider. He’s good, but has feet of clay and paid the price of his big attack on Monday by suffering today. Sastre spent much of the final kilometres riding with Lance Armstrong, who once again looked incredibly strong. Although he caught up with Armstrong by the end of the stage, his team mate Levi Leipheimer had another miserable day in the saddle. His chance of even a podium spot now appears gone for good.
While Pellizotti won the stage, Di Luca, Menchov and a resurgent Stefano Garzelli fought it out for second. Garzelli proved to have the fresher legs adding more points to his already commanding lead in the mountains classification. Di Luca though managed to put a few bike lengths into Menchov and grab the bonus seconds for third place. The gap now stands at 26 seconds between the pair. Those few seconds won’t make a massive difference but the important thing is that Di Luca has seen a chink in Menchov’s hitherto impregnable facade. Having complained on Monday about how it was impossible to break him, Di Luca now knows that maybe a well time attack on the slopes of Mount Vesusvius could give him what he needs.
Off the top of the penultimate climb of the day, Yaroslav Popovych seizes his opportunity and attacks. He, Damiano Cunego and LPR’s Gabriele Bosisio are all that’s left of the day’s break. Popovych is once again riding like his old self. Some excellent rides at the Giro in his early years saw him transfer to Lance Armstrong’s Discovery team. Although briefly touted as perhaps the next big thing, Popovych carved out a niche for himself as an incredibly able domestique. Last year he transferred to Lotto to fill the same role for Cadel Evans and was largely anonymous, dropping off the back of the bunch any time the pace went up in the mountains. This year he is back back with Armstrong and directeur sportif Johan Bruyneel at Astana and riding strongly again. Go figure.
Behind him Damiano Cunego is the one who responds. Usually a good descender, Cunego is struggling to bridge the gap. Today is his big hope of a stage win and salvaging something from what’s been a poor Giro by his standards. Indeed, to date, his most notable contribution to the race has been some slightly cryptic commentary in the press. After some earlier comments about riding with a “clear conscience”, he was back in the media again last week, speaking about how fast the race was this year. “Clearly there are others who are going stronger than me. I am giving 110 percent, and evidently it is not enough. But why do I need to worry, it is bicycle racing and there are other things in life,” he said.
Behind them, the race for the overall classification is beginning to come to the boil. The main bunch has already thinned out considerably by the top of the climb and as they approach the day’s final climb at Monte Petrano, race leader Denis Menchov’s Rabobank team are on the front.
Ivan Basso is the first to go, tracked by Menchov and Di Luca. Everyone else looks to be cooked, but as the pace slows riders begin to bridge across. Carlos Sastre, who just a moment ago looked to be in trouble, then makes his move. The first time he gets a response, the second he’s let go. Basso is the only one who tries to follow getting a gap on the chasers but still a fair bit behind the Spaniard.
Bridging up to Menchov and Di Luca is Lance Armstrong. However, his team leader Levi Leipheimer is nowhere to be seen. Inevitably, Armstrong has to drop back to wait for the struggling Leipheimer and try to pace him up the climb to limit his losses. Today is the day that the Giro slipped away from Leipheimer. The favourite almost by default at the start, since there were question marks over the form of many other contenders, the American has proved once again that he isn’t really in the top tier of riders. Armstrong, who looked well off the pace in the first half of the race is now looking ominous and appears to be riding himself into the form that would see him classed as a threat in the Tour, something which is almost unbelievable when you consider his age and the length of time he has been away from the sport.
Sastre meanwhile has caught and passed Cunego and Popovych, who have both finally succumbed to the combination of a tough stage and unyielding heat. The stage win is now his and while his gap isn’t significant, the time bonuses for the win mean that he has taken back 41 seconds from Menchov. With Leipheimer and Pellizotti blowing up, he is now up to third overall. Still 2 minutes and 19 seconds back from Menchov, he will have to attack again in the coming days if he is to take the pink jersey.
Behind him, Menchov and Di Luca catch Basso, who has been trying hard to ride himself back into contention. Basso has proven over the past two days that he is still a force to be reckoned with and finishes the day only 11 seconds behind his wilting team mate Pellizotti in the overall classification. But his riding is stil a far cry from 2006, when he won the Giro Terminator style, with over nine minutes advantage on the second placed rider.
Menchov meanwhile has played a clever game. Putting two team mates into the break meant they could drop back and help him on the approach to Monte Petrano. He doesn’t panic when Sastre attacks, since the Spaniard was three minutes down and he could afford to let him away. Instead, he sticks with Di Luca, who after the collapse of Leipheimer is his closest rival. Any time Di Luca attacks, Menchov rides right up to his wheel. Even at the close of the stage, Menchov sprints past him to take second and extend his gap over the Italian slightly. Di Luca’s peformance though has been unreal. Not a natural in the big mountains or in the time trial, he has stayed up there against all odds again this year. His only hope is that Menchov has a bad day, yet so far the Russian has looked untouchable.
Yesterday’s time trial, as expected, did bring about signficant changes to the overall classification and threw up some surprises too. Denis Menchov proved the strongest man on the day, taking the win ahead of pre-stage favourite Levi Leipheimer and a surprisingly fast Stefano Garzelli. Here’s how the overall contenders shaped up against eachother yesterday:
0.00 Denis Menchov
0.20 Levi Leipheimer
1.27 Franco Pellizotti
1.54 Danilo Di Luca
2.17 Ivan Basso
2.18 Carlos Sastre
2.46 Michael Rogers
And here’s how the overall classification looked after the stage:
0.00 Denis Menchov
0.34 Danilo Di Luca
0.40 Levi Leipheimer
2.00 Franco Pellizotti
2.52 Carlos Sastre
2.59 Michael Rogers
3.00 Ivan Basso
Let’s see how the result might affect affect the race for the overall classification.
1. Denis Menchov
The Russian now is holding most of the aces. Although his lead is relatively narrow, the remainder of the race holds three more mountain top finishes and a short, 15km time trial. Menchov has proven already that he has brought his climbing legs to the Giro, riding away from everyone else on the first serious mountain top finish on stage five. It will be hard to put time into him and indeed Menchov may very well go on the attack himself to solidfy his lead. Yet Menchov has been known to have a bad day and crack on a big mountain stage, such as on Alpe d’Huez in last year’s Tour de France. That combined with his slender lead means that victory isn’t in the bag just yet.
2. Levi Leipheimer
Although he came second, yesterday was something of a bad day at the office for the American. Why? His surest route to victory was a resounding win in the time trial and then protecting his lead for the rest of the race. Leipheimer can climb but is more of a man who just follows wheels in the mountains. Astana will no doubt drill it up the climbs, hoping to burn Menchov (and others) off before the finale, but if that doesn’t work Leipheimer will have to resort to something you rarely see him do: attack.
3. Franco Pellizotti
After getting dropped on stage five, I thought Pellizotti was doomed to domestique duty for Basso. Yet he has proved one of the surprise packages of the race, putting time into his team mate on Tuesday and a coming in ahead of him again yesterday. Pellizotti now has a minute on Basso in the general classification. Unless Liguigas bows to pressure of having one of the sport’s stars in its ranks, it is now in the enviable position of being able to play the one-two on its rivals. If either Basso or Pellizotti attack, their rivals have to respond, leaving a perfect opportunity for a counter.
4. Danilo Di Luca
He was never going to win yesterday and the time trial was all about limiting his losses, something Di Luca did remarkably effectively, since he sits only 34 seconds behind Menchov. Yet Di Luca still faces huge obstacles to winning in Rome. Not the best on the really big climbs, he is going to struggle to stay in contention on the three mountain top finishes. His best route to victory may be more stage wins like that achieved on Tuesday. Just as in 2007, Di Luca has bene punching well above his weight in this year’s Giro.
5. Carlos Sastre
Sastre isn’t a time trialist, so the focus yesterday was on staying in touch. Although he rode bravely, he is now 2.52 back on Menchov. Mountain top finishes are his forté however, as he proved last year on Alpe d’Huez, but with the time gap he has, it will probably have to repeat the feat twice. That’s a big ask.
6. Ivan Basso
The chance of a glorious comeback is now slipping through Basso’s fingers. Basso is still there or thereabouts, but is not the dominant rider we saw in the 2006 Giro. A three minute gap and a team mate ahead of him means that Basso is really up against it now. Like Sastre, he may try to attack on the uphill finishes. Unlike the Spaniard, the Pellizotti factor may mean his opportunities could be limited.
7. Michael Rogers
The former world time trial champion had a miserable day in the saddle yesterday and lost a big chunk of time to the other favourites. Although a stronger climber, Rogers isn’t the type of guy who can ride everyone else off his wheel. A top five finish is the best he can hope for now.
On the slopes of the epic climb to Sestrière, Stefano Garzelli is gunning for glory. It’s the queen stage of this year’s Giro, 260 kilometres through the mountains. The stage was originally meant to mirror the epic stage of 1949, when Fausto Coppi went on a 190 kilometre solo break to put 11 minutes into his rivals. However, issues about different radio frequencies between Italy and France, combined with the risk of landslides meant that the stage route was altered some time back, stripping Colle della Maddalena, Col de Vars and Col d’Izoard. What was set to be a savage affair still has enough to lend it the air of an epic.
Garzelli clearly has a sense of history and while he won’t rack up as many solo miles as Coppi did on that famous day, he will end up spending the guts of 120 kilometres out on his own. Although he has built up more than six minutes on the maglia rosa of Danilo Di Luca, his chances of vaulting himself back into contention for the overall classification are practically non-existant. Instead he is hoovering up the mountains points to cement his lead in the green jersey and maybe just about hang on for a win reminisicent of Claudio Chiappucci’s lone attack to Sestrière in the 1992 Tour de France.
Behind him he has two groups of chasers and ones he crosses the summit, they begin to make ground on him. Garzelli still retains the hope of latching on to his pursuers and perhaps grabbing the win.
Behind them, nothing much is expected from the main bunch. While the stage is incredibly tough, the last climb of the day is the relatively short Pra’ Martino. It’s summit is 11 kilometres from the finish and the consensus is that the run in isn’t difficult enough for any of the overall contenders to make a move.
It comes as something of a surprise then when the fireworks start at the bottom of the Martino. Liquigas once again are the team who light the fuse, with the excellent Sylvester Szmyd setting a ferocious pace that sees riders being shelled out the back of the bunch. Once Szmyd has done his work, Franco Pellizotti flies off the front. His caption Ivan Basso pauses for a moment, trying to let Pellizotti get away. The first time they try it, the bunch chases. Pellizotti’s second attack is successful however and before long he is passing and dropping Garzelli and co.
Basso is playing a clever if risky game. Pellizotti still is high enough up in the overall classification to count as a threat. Basso can wait for his rivals to launch the chase and then perhaps capitalise on it. Sure enough, race leader Danilo Di Luca begins a furious pursuit. Di Luca is protecting his jersey, but also now has the sniff of a stage win, since he stands a good chance of winning from a small bunch of the favourites, possessing as he does, a bigger kick than any of his rivals.
Not surprisingly, Di Luca catches and passes Pellizotti on the descent. Surprisingly though, Leipheirmer, Basso and a few others lose contact. Sastre, Menchov and Pellizotti manage to stay in touch. Bassos’s game has blown up in his face.
Entering the finishing town of Pinerolo, Di Luca kicks on the final drag. Only Sastre seems capable of going with him, but even the diminutive Spaniard is distanced in the end. Di Luca solos home for another stage win, having put every one of his rivals to the sword.
The stage ended up telling us far more about the race for the overall classification than we could ever have expected it to. Di Luca has put a marker firmly down that he is a contender to be reckoned with. He still has the challenge of two time trials and two mountain top finishes, neither of which suit his punchy style. Yet when he won in 2007 he proved a master of limiting his losses on such stages. Whether he can do it again against stiffer opposition remains to be seen.
Sastre, Menchov and Pellizotti have cemented their positions as dangermen and the Spaniard in particular should be written off at your peril. While everyone assumed he was building towards the Tour, he now looks like a man with the form to win.
Leipheimer and Basso looked more like mere mortals and will be kicking themselves about losing time to such a group. Although their losses are minimal, they could still count in the final shakeup. Mick Rogers meanwhile appeared to get dropped on the Martino, which doesn’t bode well for a man facing two mountain top finishes later in the race. All told, the race is still wide open.
Yesterday’s stage to Bergamo seemed unlikely to be one that would affect the overall classifcation. Although fairly lumpy, the terrain wasn’t severe enough to encourage a shake-up and the general consensus was it was likely to favour the stars of the hilly classics, since the stage covered similar territory to the Giro di Lombarida. Race leader Danilo Di Luca was in with a shout of adding a second stage win this year, while Stefano Garzelli was no doubt eyeing this up as an opportunity and Philip Gilbert probably saw it as an opportunity to bring home a much needed win after failing to register one in the spring classics campaign. Most eyes though were fixed on Damiano Cunego. The fact that he has won Lombardia three times was ample enough evidence that this was perfect stage for him.
The Italian has been having a bad Giro and was sitting three and a half minutes back in the overall classification. Having won the race in 2004, he hasn’t looked like repeating the feat, despite a number of good placings. He ended up voicing his frustration on Wednesday, when he made some thinly veiled comments about some of his rivals, claiming that he was riding with a “clear conscience”. “There’s a stage result that has punished me sometimes and then there’s a stage result, let’s say, in life, where everyone has to look at themselves in the mirror. I’m not the only who does the right thing but I do it. We’ve already seen some result rewritten when races have been archived and that hurts,” he said.
It’s not the first time he’s made these suggestions, having had a bit of an exchange earlier this year with Ivan Basso. Cunego began to make a big deal about the fact that he was riding clean last year, even sporting a temporary tattoo at the Tour de France. Previously though he had raised eyebrows due to his past association with Dr. Luigi Cecchini.
Back to yesterday’s stage, everything seemed to be going to plan for Cunego, with his Lampre team coming to the front at the business end of the stage and reeling in the day’s break. On the day’s penultimate climb, the Colle del Gallo, Cunego then sprang free in a small group containing Garzelli. However Mick Rogers and Franco Pellizotti then combined to casually toss a hand grenade into the race by also positioning themselves in the escape.
Rogers is Columbia’s man for the overall classification. A three time world time trial champion, he is capable of riding a good stage race but was a bit of an unknown quantity coming into the Giro. He has missed much of the past two years due to injury, but has begun to look like he is coming back to form this year and has been tipped as a darkhorse for the general classification and started the day third overall, just 36 seconds down from Di Luca.
Pellizotti meanwhile led Liquigas at last year’s Giro and finished a strong fourth. With Ivan Basso now on the team, the two officially are class as co-leaders, but most observers would class Pellizotti as Plan B. Basso’s primacy was underlined on stage five, when he and the other leading contenders rode away from Pellizotti on the the Alpe di Siusi. Nevertheless, he remained only 1:27 off the lead in the overall classification.
While the presence of Pellizotti and Rogers in the break didn’t seem to bother the other favourites, Astana’s Levi Leipheimer decided that he was leaving nothing to chance and attacked out of the peloton to bridge across to the group. This was now a very dangerous escape and a furious pursuit was mounted. Di Luca’s LPR team had to bury themselves at the front to protect his maglia rosa, assisted by Rabobank’s Laurens Ten Dam, who was riding for his team leader Denis Menchov. The break was duly caught, destroying Cunego and Garzelli’s chances of a stage win. With the bunch clearly wiped out from the pursuit, Kanstantsin Siutsou launched an opportunistic attack to solo home for the stage win, the second in the row for the Columbia team.
On the lower slopes of the 25 kilometre long Alpe di Siusi, the Liguigas team is already lined out at the front of the bunch. The worst of the climb lies ahead but already they are pounding out a fearsome pace. If anyone doubted that today would bring about the first major selection of the race, they could forget about it now. These men mean business and attrition is the name of the game. One by one riders drop of the back of peloton, legs burning, unable to cope with the speed of the men in the driving seat. Still 15 kilometres from the finish, the day’s break is caught. On the front now is Liguigas’s diminutive Pole Sylvester Szmyd and he’s doling out the punishment, his team leaders Ivan Basso and Franco Pellizotti tucked in behind him.
Kilometre after kilometre pass and the scalps Szmyd is claiming just get bigger and bigger. The first one to go is Lance Armstrong, the second mountain top finish in a row on which he’s dropped. Four team mates surround him and work to shepherd him to the finish and minimise his losses. Damiano Cunego then pops, a disappointing performance from the Lampre rider on what is the first real test in the Giro. Then his old sparring partner Gilberto Simoni slips off the back, but never gives up trying to pace his way back on.
Up front now there is a very select group. Ivan Basso carries on his team mates’ work, driving the pace and possibly doing too much in his enthusiasm to break his rivals further back the road. Danilo Di Luca lurks on his shoulder, knowing that if he hangs on he has a great chance of a stage win and taking the pink jersey, which currently lies on the shoulders Thomas Lövkvist, who is having the ride of his life to stay with the leaders. Levi Leipheimer is looking looking comfortable and has his Astana colleague Chris Horner riding shotgun. Meanwhile, two other big names have proven that they aren’t just here as a training exercise. Carlos Sastre and Denis Menchov are in the thick of it at the business end of the race. This group are the men, it seems, who could be contesting for victory by the time the time the race reaches its conclusion over two weeks from now.
Sastre, clearly a more confident rider since his Tour win last year, is the first to make a move in the final kilometre, jumping clear of the bunch only to get an immediate response from Menchov who blazes away off the front. Only Di Luca can respond and bravely fights to get on to the Russian’s wheel. Menchov however is too strong and takes his first Giro stage victory. Di Luca though has done enough to take the pink from Lövkvist, another good day at the office after his stage win yesterday.
After today’s stage we have a better idea of who has a realistic chance of winning. Basso, Leipheimer, Menchov, Sastre and Di Luca are all sitting pretty. Gilberto Simoni managed to limit his losses to the extend that he is still only 47 seconds down on the general classification, but such a noted climber should have cause for concern if he couldn’t hack it today. Mick Rogers also fought his way back into contention and is a mere 36 seconds down. The big losers are Armstrong, who lost almost 3 minutes today and Cunego, who is 3:29 down in the overall. Franco Pellizotti, as expected, will now probably have to relinquish his co-captaincy role with Ivan Basso, after being unable to last the pace with the favourites today. The surprise package of the day was Britain’s Bradley Wiggins, who has never been noted as a climber. Yet he remained up with the leading bunch for most the final climb and finished ahead of Cunego and Armstrong. Wiggins, judging by recent photographs at least, seems to have dropped a lot of weight and perhaps is trying to transform himself into more of an all rounder. He now sits 25th overall, 3:58 back.
The Giro d’Italia kicks off in Venice today. The centenary edition of the Italian national tour, this year’s event is a little different from the norm. It abandons its usual finish in Milan in favour of a trip to the capital city Rome and features a parcours that could throw up some interesting results. As with every Giro, there is plenty of climbing involved, but this year there isn’t much opportunity for the heavy hitters in the time trial to make an impact. The entire race is book ended by two short time trials, a 20km team affair in Venice and a 14km individual test in Rome. The main individual time trial comes on Stage 12, an epic 60km course that appears both technical and hilly. It’s the kind of TT that could allow many of the climbers to put in strong times and remain in contention.
While the Giro is one of the premier events on the cycling calendar it has always played second fiddle to the Tour de France and recent years have seen many top riders keep their powder dry until July. However, this year’s race has attracted huge array of talent for one reason or another and it is likely to be the most open Giro in years. There are five former winners taking part, in addition to two Tour de France winners and a Vuelta victor to boot. While there are some obvious favourites, many are coming back from injuries, suspension and, in one case, retirement. As a result, it’s hard to call a winner, but here are some of riders who should be in contention:
1. Levi Leipheimer
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I can hardly believe it myself, but somehow the American has emerged to be the favourite, on paper at least. Over the past couple of years he has developed into a serious grand tour contender. He grabbed second in the Vuelta last year and came third in the 2007 Tour de France. Yet there is something about Leipheimer that doesn’t convince. For a start, he appears doomed to play second fiddle to someone else. His own team hired first Ivan Basso and later Alberto Contador to play the starring role and this year he found himself slipping further down the pecking order with Lance Armstrong’s return from retirement. It is only by default that he’s found himself to be Astana’s main man for the Giro, given that Armstrong’s collar bone break put him behind schedule in terms of preparing for the Giro. One can’t help but wonder if this lack of confidence in him isn’t justified. Leipheimer is a great time trialist, but in the mountains he often comes across as a bit timid. He’s a great man for following wheels, but rarely attacks. All of this is good enough for a top five position, but you have to wonder if has the killer instinct to take a really big win.
2. Ivan Basso
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The favourite in many people’s eyes, Basso won the Giro in 2006 and then promptly got caught by the Operation Puerto doping investigation and was slapped with a two year suspension. Two years away from the sport leaves a lot of unanswered questions. At the time of his suspension he was emerging as the premier Grand Tour rider of his generation, but even the most dedicated riders (and Basso appears to have taken his training very seriously during his suspension) will struggle to get back to where they were. There is also the tricky doping question, namely how well can he do now assuming he’s riding clean (which he always insists he did, hilariously claiming he was caught before he got a chance to dope). So far, he’s been making all the right noises. His first race back in an end-season race in Japan saw him grab third behind compatriots Cunego and Visconti. He showed well in the Tirreno – Adriatico, doing a lot of hard riding for his team and then topped off his Giro preparations by winning the Giro del Trentino last month. A three week tour is a different kettle of fish and we won’t know until the racing gets going whether Basso still has the edge.
3. Damiano Cunego
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Il Piccolo Principe grabbed a surprise Giro win in 2004 at the tender age of 22, much to the annoyance of his team leader Gilberto Simoni (we’ll have more about that later). Since then however, Cunego hasn’t been able repeat the feat. His form dipped for a year or two due to a bout of glandular fever and over the past two years he has emerged as one of the premier contenders for the hilly classics. That hasn’t stopped him from throwing his hat into the ring for the Grand Tours, coming 4th in the Giro in 2006 and 5th in 2007. Last year he skipped the Italian race in favour of the Tour de France, but wilted badly in the mountains. Cunego was quiet enough in the Ardennes races in April, leading one to conclude he’s either a little off form or trying to peak for the Giro. This year’s race is suited to him however. The climbing isn’t as severe as other years, suiting his punchy style and the hilly time trial could enable him to stay in contention. The fact that he hasn’t threatened in a few years now combined with the return of Basso means that there is less local pressure on him to win, another factor that could swing in his favour.
4. Lance Armstrong
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The seven time Tour de France winner took everyone by surprise last year when he announced his return from retirement. While he says he’s doing it to promote awareness of his cancer campaign, one does get the sense that the hyper-competitive Texan couldn’t resist the lure of competing once again. With team mate Alberto Contador first in line for the leadership position at the Tour de France, Armstrong turned his attention to the Giro, a race he’s neve competed in. A few early season showings proved that he wasn’t totally off the pace at least, but he suffered a severe setback in his preparations when he broke his collar bone at the Vuelta Castilla y Leon. That left him in a race against time to regain fitness for the Giro and vaulted his team mate Levi Leipheimer into the role of Astana’s main man for the race. Armstrong is 37, hasn’t ridden a grand tour since 2005 and has very little racing in his legs going into this one. In short, he looks like a very long shot. But stranger things have been known to happen in cycling.
5. Gilberto Simoni
The veteran Italian, now aged 37, has two Giro wins under his belt and may well be in his last season. Simoni though remains a serious contender, driven by the fact that he feels he should have won more. In 2002, he missed out on repeating his win from the previous year after being suspended for cocaine use, something he was subsequently exonerated of. In 2004, his team mate Damiano Cunego managed to ride off with the win, despite the fact that he was meant to be working for his captain. Simoni is outspoken if anything and his feuds with other riders have lit up many a Giro. In 2004 he called Cunego a “bastard” in front of journalists and in 2006 he famously dubbed Ivan Basso’s riding as “extraterrestrial” pointing a finger months before Basso was named in the Puerto investigation. Cunego and Simoni have reportedly kissed and made up this year, an alliance of convenience driven by Basso’s chumminess with Armstrong. However, while Simoni will no doubt give his all, age has begun to work against him and its hard to see him mounting the top step again.
6. Danilo Di Luca
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The Killer was a surprise Giro victor in 2007. A strong rider in the hilly classics, many had doubted that Di Luca had the legs for the high mountains or the powers of recovery for a three week race. Since then he was thrown out of the Liquigas team after garnering a six month suspension over the Oil for Drugs doping scandal and is now racing with the Pro Continental outfit LPR. The upshot is that Di Luca hasn’t won as many invitations to the big races as before and, as such, is a bit of an unknown quantity at present. Still, he has looked strong at the Tirreno – Adriatico and Giro del Trentino this year, but one gets the sense that Di Luca may struggle to win against the firepower that is lining out for this year’s Giro. He’ll be in the mix and is a candidate for a stage win or two, but the overall could be beyond him.
7. Carlos Sastre
Credit: Darcy McCarty (CC Licence)
It is something of a surprise that last year’s Tour de France winner is racing the Giro this year, given that he usually concentrates his efforts on the Tour and the Vuelta. On paper, Sastre looks like he is using this as a training exercise for the Tour and if that’s the case we shouldn’t expect much from him. However, Sastre knows that he’ll be up against much stiffer competition in this year’s Tour, with the return of Alberto Contador and the fact that the Schleck brothers will be racing against him and not for him this year. The Giro could be a better shot of another grand tour win. However, Sastre has been very quiet during the year to date, so if that is the plan, he has played his cards very close to his chest. But he was also very quiet in the run up to last year’s Tour, so you never know.
8. Denis Menchov
Credit: Nattsang (CC Licence)
Like Sastre, the received wisdom is that the Russian is riding the Giro in preparation for the Tour, something he did last year too. That didn’t stop him from coming in 5th, so Menchov can’t be ruled out as a serious operator. It’s also easy to forget that he has two Vueltas already under his belt. Menchov is in no position to bank on a Tour win, so if he senses an opportunity here, he may well go for it.
9. Stefano Garzelli
Garzelli’s sole Giro win came in 2000, when his team mate Marco Pantani was on the wane. Since then Garzelli’s career has had its ups and downs and includes being thrown out of the 2002 event for doping. Now racing for the Pro Continental outfit Aqua e Sapone, Garzelli rode a good Giro in 2007, when he won two stages. However, his team failed to garner an invite for last year’s event. Garzelli doesn’t appear to have the legs to be an overall candidate any more, but judging by his form to date this year, which includes a second place at the Tirreno – Adriatico, he is likely to feature at the business end of the race and could very well grab a stage or two.
Italian rider Damiano Cunego has been talking about his ambitions for a second Giro d’Italia this year. In an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport he expressed a hope that this year’s race would be less tainted by doping than the last one. Remember, Riccardo Riccò and Emanuele Sella both rode strongly, but were subsequently busted for the new blood booster CERA. According to Cunego:
“I only hope that there is a balanced playing field, otherwise those who have talked so much about transparency would be better to keep quiet.”
Ivan Basso, who is back this year after a two year suspension, then took a swing at Cunego on Twitter:
“im reading gazzetta del sport if cunego refers to me about trasparency.i find it very funny..”
No love lost there then.
