Giro d'Italia Stage 5 – May 14th, Taranto - Viggiano 203km **Unmasked Spoilers**

dastardly00

Stage 5 – Wednesday May 14th, Taranto - Viggiano 203km (***)

Right, we should see a decent bit of action today. The riders will tackle the first Cat. 3 climb of this year’s race, Valico di Serra San Chirico. It's 8km long with an average gradient of 4.2%. The stage should get interesting with 20km to go. There is a Cat. 4 climb up to the finish line, then a technical descent, followed by the same ascent again. The gradients are only about 4%, but the last few hundred metres are at 6%. This shouldn't be a tough enough finish to trouble any of the GC contenders. It's a great stage for some of the super-domestiques to take some glory. Michael Matthews should be there or there abouts as well, and should manage to stay in pink.

Map:



Profile:



Last kilometres:



Weather - Taranto: Windy with a few clouds from time to time. High 19C. Winds NW at 40 to 55 kph. Viggiano: Rain showers in the morning, then partly cloudy and windy in the afternoon. High near 13C. Winds NW at 25 to 40 kph. Chance of rain 40%.

Betting odds: Diego Ulissi 6/1; Michael Matthews 6/1; Joaquim Rodriguez 9/1; Enrico Gasparotto 14/1; Rigoberto Uran 14/1.

Live TV coverage on Eurosport1 from 1.30pm. Highlights on Sky Sports 3 at 8pm and Eurosport1 at midnight.

Live text ticker here.

Darkglasses

I love the look of that profile, could be a lot of fun. I fancy Uran to go for glory, good chance for him to consolidate his early position.

Dr. Bre

Purrito has to go on the attack here looks like it suits him

pelevin

First week of last year's Giro was joyously chaotic & exciting, looks like this should be the first repeat of that kind of racing this year.

MPFG

Dan Moreno or Diego Ulissi are good on this type of finish

ZiabR

Darkglasses wrote: »

I love the look of that profile, could be a lot of fun. I fancy Uran to go for glory, good chance for him to consolidate his early position.

I would agree here, I think Uran has looked very good recently.

antogz1979

It looks a bit too easy for Rodriguez but I think Moreno is going to put on some hurt near the finish and give Rodriguez every chance. If Mathews is in the lead group near the top he wins,but I don't think he will be. I'd give EBH good shot at it here and I think Battaglin will give it a fair go too.I can't see Uran winning it, too many puncher climbers who are far better suited to this type of finish.

MPFG

Of course the race passes Dominico Pozzovivo's home town so expect him to have a go to.......has to make up time lost in TT

Darkglasses

Afternoon all, we're live again

Peloton's chugging along fairly quickly, this is going to be a tiring day at this rate. Not 100% sure on the breakaway situation, no graphic up yet for what gap is.

Darkglasses

Lots of sprinters gone in the break, less than 2 minutes in it

The 11 riders in the break are: Elia Viviani (Cannondale), Ben Swift (Team Sky), Tyler Farrar and Fabian Wegmann (Garmin-Sharp), Miguel Angel Rubiano (Colombia), Tony Hurel and Bjorn Thurau (Europcar), Marco Frapporti (Androni Giocattoli), Yonathan Monsalve (Neri Sottoli), Kenny Dehaes and Tosh Van der Sande (Lotto-Belisol).

Pudsy33

Cycling news tour tracker has it a 4 minutes

Bukman13

Darkglasses wrote: »

Afternoon all, we're live again

Peloton's chugging along fairly quickly, this is going to be a tiring day at this rate. No breakaway it seems.

There was an 11rider break earlier, with Swift, Vivani, in it.

Hard to how tough the finish is, Matthews has apparently been targeting this stage, so I don't see much happening GC wise, apart from the odd 8-12 second split somewhere.

MPFG

Bukman13 wrote: »

There was an 11rider break earlier, with Swift, Vivani, in it.

Hard to how tough the finish is, Matthews has apparently been targeting this stage, so I don't see much happening GC wise, apart from the odd 8-12 second split somewhere.

In his diary today Nico said that he sees the pink jersey changing hands...so many sprinters int he break inc Swift that they must think finale is too hard

Bukman13

Purito needs every second he can get, so I expect Katusha to go flat out on the 2nd to last hill. If any sprinter can get over that hill they have a good chance imo.

Darkglasses

Peloton breathing down the neck of the breakaway as they approach the climb up to Viggiano, 26km left. 4 from the breakaway have fought on by themselves, the rest are being swallowed up.

Bukman13

Good seeing Tinkoff so close to the front, Roche might fancy the finish. He usually does relatively well in these short 6-10% climbs

Pudsy33

Few Saxo lads in a crash, hopefully Nico not involved

Bukman13

Nico is safe. Deignan and Pozzovivo caught behind.

De Bhál

Bjorn Thurau
sounds like a character from Game Of Thrones

nolinejudge

They must be sick of this weather. The roads look like glass.

pelevin

Wiggins is gone out the back.

Darkglasses

pelevin wrote: »

Wiggins is gone out the back.

Wiggins is in California I think..

pelevin

Darkglasses wrote: »

Wiggins is in California I think..

I must have been getting my Giros mixed up. What year is it again?

Darkglasses

Nico's come to the front with 1 km to go

Darkglasses

Well that's the shortest attack I've ever seen, Katusha were having none of that.

godtabh

Just saw the live update. How bad was it?

Darkglasses

Ulissi, Evans, Arredondo (?)

Darkglasses

Good move by Evans, there's big splits there. Could be some big losers.

Pudsy33

That was strange from Roche, appeared to have nothing left at all when he attacked.

Darkglasses

Uran was 4th across the line, Michael Matthews, Rafal Majka and Nico Roche were also in that group.

Bukman13

Darkglasses wrote: »

Ulissi, Evans, Arredondo (?)

Yea looked like that. Don't think there were any splits from Evans down to the next 30riders.