An Italian, Carlo Benedetti, wins in Pinerolo, who at the age of 32 takes his first career victory. But Slovenia has never been more fashionable than in this edition with two Slovenians for the first time in the first two places of the general classification. By now everything is known about Primoz Roglic, Slovenian from Trbovlje, he is here to win the Giro, he has already dominated two stages, he wore the pink jersey from Bologna to Pesaro when he passed it to Valerio Conti. Jan Polanc, Slovenian from Kranj, born in 1992, however, had been somewhat forgotten even though he had already won two stages at the Giro, in 2015 at Abetone and in 2017 climbing solo on Etna. To refresh everyone's memory, the new pink jersey has been on since yesterday, good at fitting into the breakaway that determined PineroIo's order of arrival, maintaining an advantage of over 8 minutes over the group of Roglic, Nibali, Mollema and Yates at the finish line. Revolutionized classification with Polanc at the top followed by Roglic at 4'07”.
Cuneo-Pinerolo was the first stage in which the Giro tackled the real mountain with the first first-category Gpm of this edition. Nothing like that of the 1949 Giro, made famous by Coppi's legendary ride climbing the Maddalena, the Vars, the Izoard, Montgenevre and Sestrière. Other times. Yesterday no legendary pass, much less a memorable feat, but Montoso was enough, an unprecedented ascent with even double-digit slopes, to bring all the big names back to the top quarters of the rankings. Valerio Conti, who arrived 10'37" behind Benedetti, was unable to defend the pink jersey he had been wearing for six days from the San Giovanni Rotondo stage, dropping back to third place 4"51" behind Polanc: a change of leadership in any case 'within the same team, the UAE Emirates.
In the softened remake of Cuneo-Pinerolo, no solos but two races in one: in front of the 25 protagonists of the escape, behind the group with the big names who at one point accused a delay close to fifteen minutes. All waiting for Montoso to see who will be the first to attack. Among the pacesetters the liveliest is Brambilla whose sprint thins the lead rope with only Capecchi and the Irishman Dunbar ready to respond. It seems like the winning trio but by dint of taking care of themselves they are joined by Benedetti and Caruso. And it is precisely the latter who place themselves in the first two places in the final sprint. Polanc finishes fifth at 25”. Meanwhile, among the big names, the first to light the fuse on Montoso are Miguel Angel Lopez and Mikel Landa, a successful attack with which the two most disappointing (with Yates) in the San Marino time trial recover almost half a minute from Roglic and Nibali.
Today the Giro climbs the 2247 meters of Lago Serrù above Ceresole Reale. The Giro will now stop between majestic peaks allowing less and less plain. Stages for eagles in which the acute note of the Shark is also expected. Caleb Ewan who is not an eagle, after Viviani, also packed his bags and left the Giro leaving the memory of two winning sprints.
