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Published on Saturday, 06 May 2017 21:20

Giro d'Italia St 3

Tortoli to Cagliari

Sunday 7th May, 148kms

Stage 3 then and there isn't much to say about this one, an almost dead flat stage where they spend most of the day on the coast, looping around the east side of Sardinia and on to the finish in Cagliari on the southern coast.   

So two stages down and two crazy days so far, with another on the cards for today. So far we have seen two sprints, but neither of which were straight-forward and we've seen the lead change hands twice already. 

Well, that didn't exactly work out as planned today. The slow, slow pace of the race meant that the sprinters were able to hang in there, well, all bar Sam Bennett and Nizzolo.. Bennett I'm really surprised with, Nizzolo I wasn't, he had flagged that up for us yesterday. In the end, Greipel took a superb stage win for Lotto-Soudal, and with it land his first Maglia Rosa of his illustrious career. Caleb Ewan was very unlucky, pulling his foot out of his pedal after a little bump from Gaviria in the sprint, he could well have challenged Greipel, but we'll never know. It just goes to show that the teams don't always read a stage or get their predictions right, Matty White of Orica didn't think the sprinters would make it, his man Ewan actually could have won it.. 

For the second day in a row Fernando Gaviria was disappointing, failing to land a podium spot for his backers. It's pretty poor that supposedly one of the fastest sprinters in the world can't beat Jasper Stuyven and Roberto Ferrari in a sprint. Speaking of Stuyven, as I flagged up, he was indeed the main man for Trek today, with Nizzolo finishing a long way back. It was a good sprint from Stuyven to land 3rd place.

I don't know what to make of Ferrari sprinting like he did today, does it mean Modolo is not 100%? How does that leave his standing for the points competition? He was way back in 37th place today, it looked like he started leading out Ferrari and swept to the left with about 300m to go, he didn't even contest the sprint.. It may be just he wasn't feeling 100%, but strange that he wasn't up there. Our man Battaglin wasn't far off at all in 6th, he'll get closer yet in this race I think. 

So Modolo beat Nizzolo for us but the fact Gaviria was beaten by Greipel bust the other matchbets, the treble came close with Sbaragli and Battaglin winning. Good news I suppose was the sight of Omar Fraile sprinting out of the pack to take 8pts in the KOM competition, signaling his intentions, he now sits in 3rd behind Teklehaimanot, who was superb today to take the max points and the KOM jersey. Pierre Rolland took 2nd in the KOM sprint ahead of Fraile, looks like he might have designs on that jersey too. Fraile has been cut to 9/4 favourite though, which is good to see. 

The Route

This is probably the most boring stage of the entire race on paper - it's short at 148kms, they could be done in just over 3 hours and it's almost dead flat. There are a few tiny lumps and bumps along the way and they've even eked out a Cat 4 climb of the Capo Boi with 41kms to go.

The last 5kms are completely flat, but with 4.5kms to go they go right on a roundabout, which looks worse than it is on the map, as you can see in the picture on the right they will just go to the right of the big roundabout and the road is wide and very smooth.

Then it straightens up for the next 2kms until another, straighter roundabout with 2.5kms to go and then it's down on to the Via Roma where the last 1500m are almost dead flat. One thing about the Via Roma though is that it's surface is concrete flagstones, as you can see in the picture below. It shouldn't be too much of a problem, but it's not a dead smooth asphalt road like in the run-in. 

What is more important to bear in mind though is the weather - it's going to be cloudy, but dry, but the wind is really going to be whipping up. A north-westerly wind that will be hitting speeds of 35kmph in the afternoon will mean that they will have a tail/crosswind all day as they head south, making it extremely fast, and could raise the possibilities of echelons and splits. Then when they hit the southern coast before the Capo Boi they turn right and straight in to a very strong block head-wind that will kill off the break, but also make life even more difficult for the sprinters teams in the last 50kms. The sprint itself will also be in to a strong headwind, so timing and positioning will be crucial. 

Contenders and Favourites

Today could be one of those stages you see in some Grand Tours where out of nowhere we have carnage and chaos. We saw it in Holland last year where the race blew to pieces on only the 3rd stage, with more than 60 riders finishing around 5 minutes down. It was the wind in Holland that caused the damage, it could be the same here. It might not make much impact for the first 100kms or so as they head south with a general tail-wind, but as soon as they attack the Capo Boi I think it will be all-out war for the last 50kms as some teams look to split the race up and go full gas. It is a rest day the next day after all, so 50kms of full effort and a rest after it shouldn't cost them too much energy in the grand scheme of things. 

GC men will have to stay alert and to the fore, meaning we are going to have GC teams mixing with sprint trains and it could all get quite messy. Could we see some of the sprinters miss the splits? Yes, it's possible.. Caleb Ewan needs to watch himself, Gaviria should be ok with the experience of Quickstep, in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if they were the ones doing the pushing. André Greipel is pretty experienced and battle-hardened to know where to be and what to do, but it's a pretty young and inexperienced team he has here with him, they might struggle if things get a bit wild.

Trek look like a team that will be right up front with Quickstep, but what Nizzolo will turn up tomorrow? Bora Hansgrohe aren't the best team, but Konrad and Bennett are generally good at positioning themselves but Bennett's performance today is worrying, he finished almost dead last on the stage. 

So we have had two incredibly slow days so far, headwinds and sticky roads have meant that we haven't really seen this Giro come to life yet. The sprinters, who could and should have been dropped on that climb today, had they been racing hard, fought out today's finish, and with a dead-flat day tomorrow, it's going to end in a sprint again you'd have to think. That is, unless some teams want to try to stir things up in the wind and try to force splits. Some of Quintana's rivals have said tha they want to make the race hard for him, tomorrow could be one of those stages where they might catch him out, if they are brave enough. 

André Greipel was head and shoulders above the rest today, but would he have had serious competition from Ewan, had he not unclipped? I think so, Ewan was very upset afterwards, he says that he felt he has the legs to win and it was the bump from Gaviria that caused him to lose the race. Ewan is sure to have the whole team working hard for him tomorrow to try to make up for today, this flat profile suits them a lot more. The wind is going to be a problem, but if he can stay out of trouble and get to the sprint, his low profile sprint could give him an advantage over the bigger Griepel. Looking at the results so far, you'd have to think they will be the main two protagonists in the sprint, there are lots of question marks about all the others around them.

Looking again at the sprint tonight, Fernando Gaviria was actually sprinting pretty well but seemed to just tie up in the last 50m and it may have been that all the climbing took a little out of his legs. He could still be a big danger tomorrow too, but can you risk backing him?

Where will Giacomo Nizzolo and Sacha Modolo be tomorrow? Both could be fighting it out, but can you trust them after today's result? Sam Bennett could be involved, but today's performance worries me.. He finished a long way down when a lot of other similar sprinters made it to the finish. Stuyven won't be beating these guys either tomorrow, even if he is given the freedom to sprint, and it's unlikely we'll see Roberto Ferrari up there for a second day in a row! Ryan Gibbons and Enrico Battaglin are getting closer, but they won't beat the top two I think. 

So it could be a wild day, or it could be another snorefest - two days running now the race has come in way beyond the slowest time limit, will they try to light it up tomorrow? We'll see.. but I think even if it gets wild and windy and strung out at times, we're still going to see a sprint royale again, and if it doesn't get wild, then it's almost certainly end in a sprint. And I think Ewan will make up for today's stage and sprint to victory while polishing his chin off the front wheel.

Looks like the bookies concur though, he's very short at 11/8. The 6/4 with Skybet is slightly better, I'm having a bet on that. Hard to call any of the other guys behind them with confidence for the podium, Gavira has let his backers down twice now, Nizzolo, Modolo and Bennett could be anywhere, but Sbaragli, Gibbons and Battaglin are riding pretty consistently. Gibbons looks a great price at 7/4 to beat Stuyven in their matchbet. 

Recommendations:

2pt win on Caleb Ewan at 6/4 with Skybet

Matchbets:

Gibbons to beat Stuyven - 2pts at 7/4

Battaglin to beat Kuznetsov, Sbaragli Vs Marezcko & Modolo to beat Pelucchi - 2pts on the treble at 9/4 with 365