Giro stage 20 Verbania - Sestriere

antogz1979

Last big day in the mountains, climbing Finistre. Another legendary climb, harder than Zoncolan in my opinion. Contador has the race wrapped it. Will he win today, well its his decision, if he wants to he will. He could go out and decimate the field again!!!. He really has been a joy to watch and hopefully he rides the Tour to make it interesting. Schleck, Basso and Evans don't really appeal that much( wheel suckers). Hopefully Rodriguez can do something today.

BTH

It looks terrifying and awesome. Definitely don't want to miss this.

http://t.co/vDQxdtW

antogz1979

The Hitch should look for a job with cyclingnews thats an excellent preview.

Morrisseeee

Well, this should be epic, ie. for 2nd place and the rest of the top 10 ! I reckon if Nibali is in as good a form as yesterday then he will eat into Scarponi's advantage, especially on the descent (if needed).

The Stage:


The views:



The climb:
18.62km @ 9.1% :eek:

Chips Lovell

antogz1979 wrote: »

...Evans don't really appeal that much( wheel suckers).

Winning the toughest stage in last years Giro like a boss while wearing the world champion's jersey = wheelsucker

antogz1979

el tonto wrote: »

Winning the toughest stage in last years Giro like a boss while wearing the world champion's jersey = wheelsucker

I was talking about the Tour, thats all he ever does. You can't say he is not known for it. Bravo with the example, you must have been a while finding that:rolleyes:

Chips Lovell

Garzelli should probably make sure to get in the break today. Either that or hope its all together going over Finestre. If not, Contador could end up taking the mountains jersey as well.

antogz1979 wrote: »

I was talking about the Tour, thats all he ever does. You can't say he is not known for it. Bravo with the example, you must have been a while finding that:rolleyes:

Up to a few years ago people were calling him that, but he's hardly that kind of rider today. Anyhow, how do you think having Contador in the Tour will make it more exciting? Surely the best grand tours are those where there's actually a bit of competition for the jersey. Contador's dominance of this year's Giro has made it the most underwhelming edition since Basso won by nine minutes in 2006.

Morrisseeee

More about that climb............:cool:

Unforgiving because it maintains a consistently high gradient, offering no flatter sections for even a little bit of a restbite.

Unforgiving because it is has an average gradient of 9.2%.

Unforgiving because it lasts for 18 and a half kilometres.

18 and a half kilometres, the last 17 of which don’t go under 8.3%

But that is not where the difficulties of the Finestre stop.

If the Zoncolan or Grossglockner, are adrelaline fuelled pschycos , packing in their high gradients into small spaces to put off riders, the Finestre is a cold calculated killer.

First, to break the riders, the climb throws in her steepest ramp early with a 14% section being hit at 1.9km , with over 16km of climbing still to go.

This is an early cull. Only the strongest survive. With the exception of a few superdomestiques and any riders up the road, the chances of individuals to help their team leader's ends here.

The climb then maintains a steady but very high average for kilometre after kilometre, breaking everyone and anyone who miscalculates their effort even slightly. The sharp turns the riders are forced to take every now and again, do little to help their situation.
“the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.” To quote Thucydides.

By the 10k mark, the climb will have brought the the riders to breaking point. Climbs of over 9% generally tend to come to an end by this point.

That’s when the Finestre comes in for the kill.

It takes away from the riders the asphalt. The road becomes a glorified goat track. True to its nature, the mountain maintains the steady high grades which define it. We saw what unpaved road did to Nieve at Gardeccia. That was 150m and barely uphill. Try 8000m at 9%
On the gravel, the brutal turns become even more challenging, especially with 12% sections and nothing remotely flat in sight.
What will be in sight will be the signs telling the riders how far it is to the top. Unfortunately for them, after 14km of a 9% climb, they are not going to believe the signs. This is one of those very rare stretches of road in cycling, where every 2km can take 10 minutes to complete.

The good news for the riders is that at some point they will reach the top. But with a climb of this length and of this gradient after this many weeks of cycling, there is no way of knowing how long it will take.

Nevertheless, finally after 215k of racing and 20km of insane climbing, some time during the afternoon of May 28th 2011 the lead riders will fight it out for the prestigious kom title at the top of the Finestre.

That is when they will look down into the Olympic Valley.

Morrisseeee

Prediction: Rujano to attack (with Contador helping) and they will try and eat into the time difference, Nibali/Scarponi both watching each other and hoping to just set a high steady pace back to the 'attackers'.

Chips Lovell

I don't know about Rujano. He seems to be fading. He lost contact very early yesterday.

Nibali v Scarponi is the interesting one. Nibali's the better TTer, but both will be fretting about whether the gap is big/small enough going into tomorrow.

Also, I don't see Contador gifting stages today if he's in that position again. Sestriere is a big one. Lot of history around this finish.

Morrisseeee

Yeah, he had a tough day yesterday, but I suppose it's his last chance and I'm thinking he'll give it a go, and if he does Conti might go with him, maybe even drag him up the 'hill', sure it's no sweat to Conti (he seems to be just as happy doing 25km/h as opposed to 15km/h up those gradients !!).

BTH

Thats awesome tv. The helicopter keeps switching between different groups on the switch-back roads. Looks amazing.

Chips Lovell

I was wrong about Rujano.

Kiriyienka is a machine.

Hermy

Eurosport not showing this???

-Trek-

Hermy wrote: »

Eurosport not showing this???

I have it on the player so it should be on TV as well. Or at least its on the schedule.

buffalo

Hermy wrote: »

Eurosport not showing this???

Yep. I'm watching it now. It's scheduled 'til 4.30.

Hermy

Mine is a German feed so they're showing indoor football.
After nearly three weeks of coverage they give up.:(