Foggia—Guardia Sanframondi, 170km
When young dawn with her rosy-red fingers rose once more, the riders geared up for another stage of the Giro d’Italia. The whole first half of the stage was uncategorized climbing….until the categorized climbing began. It was a ferocious fight to get into the breakaway today. For the first 60km of the 170km stage the whole peloton fought to launch and cover moves. I mean it when I say everyone was involved, even Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) tried to get into a move—which is of course a hilarious concept to think he could actually be allowed to get away. There is no way other General Classification (GC) team would let Egan Bernal who lies third overall on the GC get away. He is only 16 seconds behind race leader and Pink Jersey wearer Attila Vallter (Groupama-FDJ). And in between Attila the HUNgarian and Egan Bernal sits the young Belgian phenom Remco Evenepoel (Deceuninck-Quickstep) at 11 seconds down. These time gaps weighed heavily on the tactics of the day. As said, it was uncategorized climbing out of the gates, which always suits the breakaway because one must have good climbing legs to even get away. Then the breakaway that succeeds to get away is full of strong climbers for the rest of the mountainous stage—increasing their chances of staying away for the whole day. That is partially why it was such a serious fight to get into the breakaway. The other reason specifically for today was the GC time gaps and the route profile. With only a few descents, the stage basically climbed for the whole first 120km to the top of the Category2 Bocca Della Selva climb, at the peak of this climb was a some-40km descent—with the occasional rising ramp thrown in on the way down. Then the stage finished with 10km of climbing, the last three were categorized to comprise a Category4 finishing climb. So if the breakaway could get over that Category2 climb at 50km to go with a couple minutes, there was a very good chance they would survive and stay away to the finish—for on the 40km descent, it is hard for any collective group to pull back or pull out more than a minute on a breakaway out front. Additionally, Groupama-FDJ’s team is not really built to support any serious GC hopes for Attila the HUNgarian, and in any uphill stage finish and sprint Remco Evenepoel would be one of the favorites amongst the GC contenders. Were Remco to win the stage, he would earn a 10-second time bonus. And if Remco were to finish at least 2 seconds ahead while Attila was out of the top three, Remco would then have 12 seconds on hand to wrest the Pink Jersey away from Attila the HUNgarian. Thus, what interest did Groupama-FDJ have in keeping the breakaway in check? Groupama wanted a breakaway of non-GC threats to go up the road and stay away and mop up the bonus seconds at the finish in order to protect Attila’s Pink Jersey. Then Attila would only need to finish the stage together with Remco and Bernal to retain the maglia rosa for another day. And this is how the stage played out.
To me, the early day fight for the breakaway is much like night fighting in ancient warfare. Rarely did it ever take place. In all twenty-four books or chapters of the Iliad, only one contains fighting that takes place at night. Why did they not fight at night in the ancient world? Because then it could not be seen who achieved the glory—it was not known who slew who. How could one increase their fame and build their immortal legend via night fighting? Such epic fights to get into the breakaway seem the same to me today, because it is only within the last two or three years where cycling subscriptions became so thoroughly prevalent that the Giro and Tour organizers decided to broadcast the entire stage wire-to-wire. Before this, the early day fight for the breakaway was always a night-time rumor—for myself in America, the fight for the breakaway is literally routinely done before young dawn rose with her rosy-red fingers. So, with it established as a given that it was a bitter struggle to make the breakaway today, allow me to now rattle through the men who were already victors in a way. Yes, yes, after such a hard battle surely they had already proven themselves and taken a small victory just to still be in a chance for the win. Let the fame of the following names and teams be increased: Alexis Gougeard (AG2R Citreon), Victor Lafay (Cofidis), Kobe Goossens (Lotto Soudal), Giovanni Carboni (Bardiani-CSF-Fanzine), Francesco Gavazzi (Eolo-Kometa), Nelson Oliviera (Movistar), Nikias Arndt (Team DSM), Victor Campenaerts (Qhubeka Assos), and Fernando Gaviria (UAE). With 100km to go, this was the group that was away. Behind, Groupama-FDJ, Deceuninck-Quickstep, and the Ineos Grenadiers were satisfied with its composition for there were no GC threats amongst them. Thus, the peloton sat up and eased off setting only a respectable pace to the top of the long Category2 climb. With 90km to go, this breakaway already had a 5-minute lead on the peloton, and by 60km to go over 7 minutes. Surely, it was playing out how Groupama wanted, the win would come from the breakaway.
So who were the favorites amongst this group: not just the favorites physically, but in the way of cycling-fandom admiration as well? Even amongst avid cycling fans: Cofidis’ Victor Lafay, Lotto’s Kobe Goossens, Bardiani’s Giovanni Carboni, and Eolo’s Francesco Gavazzi were virtually unknowns, and now for the first time making names for themselves. The Frenchman Alexis Gougeard has been with the French team AG2R for years, but it has been a long time since I remember watching him take an electric Vuelta stage in 2015. Movistar’s Portuguese rider Nelson Oliviera has had a similar win drought—actually his last win was also from that same 2015 Vuelta. Beyond that, Nikias Arndt is the Team DSM veteran semi-hardman-sprinter; he has had a long career and this would be a great win for him. There was Qhubeka’s Victor Campenaerts, the current Hour Record holder—the crown jewel of Time Trialing. But Campenaerts’ TT-ing abilities seem to have dropped off a cliff in the past year as he has seemed to shift focus. And then at the top of the list of notable names was the Colombian Fernando Gaviria. In 2017 when he rode for Quickstep he took four stage wins at the Giro, and every single one was electric. The next year in 2018, he took two more electric stage wins at the Tour de France. But in 2019 he moved to UAE where ever since he has been plagued with injury and illness—including TWO bouts of Coronavirus. O! And did I mention those four Giro stages and two Tour stages all came from sprints? Yes, this is the same Gaviria that launched early yesterday in the sprint and was bested by Caleb Ewan (Lotto Soudal). (An Author’s Note: For the record it should be said, Caleb Ewan actually abandoned the Giro this morning in that ferocious fight for the breakaway citing knee problems). So perhaps Gaviria has been less confident in his form, knowing better sprinters are here; and that might have been why he daringly hopped into a mountain-stage breakaway today. As far as sprinters go, he is one of the better climbers—he is from Colombia of course—but to win at the top of a Category4 climb would still be a tall order. But despite the tall order, amongst this group I am sure many were rooting for him to re-find or re-charge that electric 2017 form: a win today would do much for his confidence. Such were the stakes this day, if the famous Fernando Gaviria could be beaten, it would be a well earned win for someone not often or at least not recently in the spotlight.
There was not much action on the way up the mighty 18km Category2 climb. Just to get into the breakaway today, all—including Gaviria—had proven they had the legs to be here. Towards the summit the grey clouds above threatened rain for the descent. Accordingly, many put on raincoats. But one chose another method. The Norman—a tough northern people for the past millennia by all accounts—Alexis Gougeard opted instead for the ancient cycling heat-insulator: simply stuffing some newspaper down his jersey. O! O! All must love an old-school trick such as this. It is one of those simple romantic cycling traditions that seems it shall stand the test of time despite how technologically advanced cycling clothing becomes year by year. For a century this newspaper insulator has proven effective. If you were an impartial observer of this stage, such a swashbuckling gesture—and it was swashbuckling—should be enough to win your loyalty for the day.
Over the top and down the descent they flew. O! Despite the grey skies, I must say Italy was on point this day! The mountain vistas far in the background with lush green valleys were melting my heart. All the green was extremely beautiful, and surely we have seen enough May showers this Giro to see where it has all come from. The descent was fun as well, the top of it had not only the stunning views, but wide-sweeping turns perfect for fast and relatively safe descending. But as they came about a third of the way down, an occasional rise would need to be tackled. At this point, anyone less confident in their climbing legs amongst the group tried an attack. Yet still, it was a headscratcher to see Fernando Gaviria the sprinter to opt for a solo breakaway bid with 38km to go—some-20km still to descend. But there he was on the attack….for about a single minute. The camera was following behind these other chasers, and on a righthand switchback all of a sudden they were passing Fernanado Gaviria would have hit the deck on a sharper turn. Alas! alas! With such a fall surely his morale was cooked, surely he would not be getting his mojo back today. Gaviria remounted his bike and slowly pushed on clearly suffering from his fall. He was not making much of an effort to even rejoin his breakaway group now 35-seconds ahead that had just passed him…until something unexpected happened. The white medical convertible came up to him to dress and treat his wounds. This is the only car the riders are legally allowed to hold onto so that the medics can properly address the injuries while the race continues—isn’t cycling a wild sport? Now Gaviria did seem to have hit the deck hard, parts of his shorts were ripped up, and there was scrapes and blood on his arms; but it was a notably long visit to the medical car. Then a handful minutes after the medical appointment was finally over, suddenly Fernando Gaviria had ridden himself back into the breakaway group. Yes, you can put the dots together: on the descent holding onto the medical car, Gaviria was toted back within reach of the breakaway. It seems much of the toting too took place on one of the few uphill drags where the breakaway actually had to expend significant energy. I don’t think anyone could classify this as cheating for the medical car is of course neutral; but it was quite a bit of romantic gamesmanship on Gaviria’s part to drag out a medical visit so long. I think most found it a comical sight more than anything. Gaviria had crashed heavily; it was very unlikely he would be a threat once the road started climbing again at the end for the finale.
Once the breakaway got to the bottom of the descent and started climbing with 10km to go, this proved to be the case. Gaviria admirably held on as long as he could, and longer than most of us expected, but eventually he was dropped amongst the many ferocious attacks. This breakaway had violently been trying to tear itself apart for the entire last 30km of the stage—before the descent was even finished. Most wanted a gap on whoever looked fresher or seemed a better climber, but so many of the guys were unknown quantities everyone was just rolling dice and casting lots. Again, this was a showcase of unbridled Giro racing. The attacks were absolutely relentless—image a boxing match with eight individual combats all taking shots at one another. As each rider attacked, not only did they not know if any others had the legs to go with them…they themselves did not really know if they had the legs to finish off the job all the way to the finish line. It was the tough Norman Alexis Gougeard and the Belgian Hour Record Holder Victor Campenaerts who kept swinging the most punches—and my O! my were some supremely formidable. But still Movistar’s Nelson Oliviera or Bardiani’s Carboni would not let anyone really get away. Still Gougeard and Campenaerts tried and tried, each had at least one that really looked like it would go clear for good.
Finally, with 7km still to race, Victor Campenaerts went clear with Carboni of Bardiani. The elastic seemed to have snapped, they had a 12-second gap to the chasers—save Norman Gougeard in the middle desperately trying to bridge up to the leading pair. Gougeard rode and rode, turning himself absolutely inside out, knowing this was his best chance at a Grand Tour stage win for the past six years since his last! O! O! To try to comprehend the mental fortitude needed to dig so deep working in conjunction with top physical form, truly that is what separates the champions from the others. Gougeard gave it everything and dug as deep as he could possibly go, but ahead Campenaerts and Carboni were evenly rotating like clockwork. Gougeard could not reel back the leading pair. Then Gougeard hit the wall, his last shot fired, his hopes fully dashed. With 3.3km to go, many things happened at once. Ahead Carboni attacked Campenaerts in the hopes to climb away solo. Behind, Gougeard was reeled in by the group of chasers led by Nelson Oliviera. But from around Oliviera came the underdog and unknown quantity the Frenchman Victor Lafay knowing it was now or never! Ahead Carboni rode away, daring to dream of a stage win at his home Giro d’Italia for his Italian team. Ah! It would have been the stuff of legend. But it seemed he had worked too hard, for behind like the little tank engine that could came the 25-year-old Victor Lafay for the Cofidis team. He had used his anonymity to its fullest advantage, to this point he had always only followed and was rarely even expected to actively mark the striking attackers. It seems on this day he had conserved his energy the best, and waited for the perfect time to take only one powerful and massive sniper-rifle shot for glory. And it paid off. Campenaerts had already faded, and Carboni was already in his crosshairs. With 2.4k to go, Lafay caught and passed Carboni without letting up at all—the proper tactics in such an endgame as this. The last kilometers were certainly still rising, but Lafay was flying away.
Thus young Victor Lafay with his rosy-red cheeks rose over the horizon to approach the finish line like Homer’s oft repeated dawning line. It was a spectacular accomplishment for this 25-year-old Frenchman who appears to have the rosiest-red cheeks I have ever seen. May his career be really only just beginning so that if for no other reason we can get to the bottom of this already iconic and awesome facial feature—is this completely natural? It was a great win for his Cofidis team as well, for though they have not much been in attendance at this Italian Grand Tour for the past decade, this is their first Giro stage win in 11 years. Congratulations to you Victor Lafay, this was your day of glory. You cleared the first hurdle and won your first victory by making the break earlier in the day; then clearly you played it the best in the finale. It was not even much of a case of things falling into place for you on the final climb. You won by 36 seconds, none really had a prayer to stop you in that last 3km. Victor, you proved the Man of the Match.
It was a fine Saturday Showcase for some startups in the Breakaway. Behind the top GC men all finished together without any significant action just as Groupama-FDJ had hoped. And Attila the HUNgarian keeps Pink for another day. Ah! But tomorrow this young Attila shall be tested in what is billed to be a Sunday GC Showcase in the Apennine Mountains. All shall try, but few shall rest easy this night with the Apennine Queen stage tomorrow.
Cycling Odysseys 