Giro D'Italia Stage 4: Catania to Villafranco Tirrena (140km)

mr spuckler

Continuing the theme of short stages, the GC battle should calm down again after yesterday's madness with the biggest climb of the day a category 3 starting just after the 50km mark and topping out around half way through the stage.

It's possible that a breakaway could stick but more likely that the sprinters will fancy a crack at this one. Could this finally be Sagan's day? The bookies certainly seem to think so. Then again look at what the bookies thought yesterday...







Favourites for the stage:
Peter Sagan 11/4
Arnaud Demare 17/4
Michael Matthews 9/2
Fernando Gaviria 11/2
Davide Ballerini 9/1
Thomas de Gendt 16/1
Ben Swift 20/1
Elia Viviani 20/1

I think poor old Viviani could do with a win, he's been on a rotten run this year.

Inquitus

Deleted User wrote: »

I think poor old Viviani could do with a win, he's been on a rotten run this year.

What about poor Mr Sagan?

mr spuckler

Deleted User wrote: »

I think poor old Viviani could do with a win, he's been on a rotten run this year.

I've extended the list of bookies favourites now to include him for you

Inquitus

Inquitus wrote: »

What about poor Mr Sagan?

I asked the 2 year old who she likes for the win today there, she's pretty sure Sam Bennett is winning the race today, just like he did yesterday and twice the day before no less. I tried to argue that those lads didn't have a green jersey and it was reasoned that he must have got juice on it. Sound logic.

Mefistofelino

Thomas is a DNS

Richard Hillman

Fractured pelvis so he won't be going to the Vuelta either.

Tough as nails to finish that stage

Tim76

Think that's his second time doing the pelvis

mr spuckler

More bidon related crashes :eek:

Bambaata

Other than Thomas out any other drama today yet? Just starting watching

Any word on what happened Yates yesterday, or is he just ****?

Inquitus

Bora making it interesting, trying to get rid of sprinters for Sagan presumably.

mr spuckler

Bambaata wrote: »

Other than Thomas out any other drama today yet? Just starting watching

Any word on what happened Yates yesterday, or is he just ****?

Just the minor drama when a Trek rider took a bidon from a soigneur and somehow unbalanced himself and fell, taking a Movistar rider with him. No real harm done from what I saw anyway.

No word on Yates, other than them saying he had a bad day.

Rogue EF bottle there avoided.

Tim76

Bambaata wrote: »

Any word on what happened Yates yesterday, or is he just ****?

I backed Yates, that's the only explanation for his disastrous collapse.

mr spuckler

Demare looks like he's just wearing the generic podium version nationals jersey rather than a team issue one.

mr spuckler

That was tight! Sagan looked like he half sat up a bit out from the line.

Inquitus

Demare apparently, looked like Sagan live and then Demare in the slowmo, but hard to be sure visually. They have made their decision anyways!

Dodge

mr spuckler wrote: »

That was tight! Sagan looked like he half sat up a bit out from the line.

Good sprint by Démare in fairness. Looked like he was surprised by Sagan taking it up but got there, just, in the end

mr spuckler

That doesn't look great with the 2 fellas on the ground

Yeah what happened the barrier was over the road, and one lad tangled in the advertising. Maybe caught it and dragged it into the road?

dastardly00

A did a quick search of ProCyclingStats and by my reckoning today was Sagan's 71st time finishing in second place in a World Tour level stage race or one-day race (so excluding TTs, TTTs and GC).

71 times a runner-up!! :eek:

dahat

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Yeah what happened the barrier was over the road, and one lad tangled in the advertising. Maybe caught it and dragged it into the road?

Helicopter apparently flying too low and blew it into the riders path.

Inquitus

https://twitter.com/laflammerouge16/status/1313482483929944064

dahat

dahat wrote: »

Helicopter apparently flying too low and blew it into the riders path.

Yeah just saw that on sticky bottle.

neris

https://twitter.com/brentbookwalter/status/1313494119889735683?s=19

neris

https://twitter.com/laflammerouge16/status/1313544550116397063?s=19

eeeee

Deleted User wrote: »

I asked the 2 year old who she likes for the win today there, she's pretty sure Sam Bennett is winning the race today, just like he did yesterday and twice the day before no less. I tried to argue that those lads didn't have a green jersey and it was reasoned that he must have got juice on it. Sound logic.

We are gonna need her commentary on every stage :pac:






Crash sounded horrific, should be big consequences for the organisers with that one.

velo.2010

Another bidon related incident today. Pieter Weening should not have been allowed to continue after his crash. Clearly walloped his head off the ground and struggled to remount, and that was the Giro's(RCS) head doctor that was standing there with him. Reminded me of Bardet being allowed to continue during the Tour.

velo.2010

velo.2010 wrote: »

Another bidon related incident today. Pieter Weening should not have been allowed to continue after his crash. Clearly walloped his head off the ground and struggled to remount, and that was the Giro's(RCS) head doctor that was standing there with him. Reminded me of Bardet being allowed to continue during the Tour.

Went looking for this crash and hadn't actually seen him talk about this before as it's a video from this year and the crash was 2017.

Pretty shocking and not just the crash.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPc0qwYVF4M

Weening video here https://www.eurosport.co.uk/cycling/giro-d-italia/2020/giro-d-italia-crash-peter-weening_vid1366462/video.shtml

No way he should have been allowed back up on a bike.

mr spuckler

eeeee wrote: »

Crash sounded horrific, should be big consequences for the organisers with that one.

It did and it was so bizarre to see when they showed it after the finish. Literally just the 2 cyclists lying there by themselves and it seemed to take an age for anybody to come to their assistance. Awful injuries from the earlier post