Giro d’Italia Preview

51 thoughts on “Giro d’Italia Preview”

1. Where/when is the scar on Gaudu’s knee from?
   Looks like a pretty major knee cap break?

   • Just road rash at the time I think.

2. I just hope someone can challenge Roglič. Ideally, more than one person, but I’d settle for one.

   A fit Evenepoel would be a massive fillip for this race in terms of entertainment, whereas he’s unlikely to challenge in the TdF. That’s why I find it strange that – pre-injury – he wasn’t targeting this race. Better to win the Giro than podium the TdF (especially if you’ve already done that). There are other riders who might well fit into that category.

   • Rumours say he was actually going to tackle this and then going to the TDF to see what he could get. RCS even had an announcement ready as a late surprise, but…

     As for your final note, I’m hoping the best for Gaudu, he’s been massively promising, but it looks like he went into an involution of sort just when he could be expected to further step up. Maybe inrng knows more, being always especially well informed on everything French?

     It would be fine if he could avoid Pinot and Bardet’s fate – Pinot, hugely apt for the Giro, 3 participation out of some 18 GTs he tackled, and all in all it is where he got his best average results in GTs!
     Obviously you can’t say the same for Bardet who was extremely focussed on the TDF, never invested much on the Vuelta either, and really achieved his top results in France, yet his first Giro was the year when he’d be 31, after two declining season and had to switch team to get that (plus a fair long sunset for his career with some decent seasons 2021-2024, which had started to look impossible in 2020 and already improbable in 2019). I can see him getting something better in Italy, had he tried before, considering how promising 2022 had been looking.

     Of course it’s easy to understand their situation. Many an Italian rider lost opportunities just getting obsessed with the Giro, imagine French athletes with the TDF which is even bigger just for everybody. Yet, it’s equally manifest that, although the TDF adapted itself also in order to favour them, the Giro would have offered much more of a reward, be it only in just enjoying what you’re doing on a terrain and context which is often perfect for your qualities.

     I’m not really sure if the above is true for Gaudu, too. He looks very suited for the Vuelta, for example, unlike Bardet. But I’m very curious to know.

     • Evenepoel wants to go back to the Tour de France and improve on last year’s result, if only to get third place again with the option of doing better and being closer to Pogačar and Vingegaard and hoping to get more stage wins, this is what he told Swiss TV at Romandie. Having won the Vuelta he doesn’t need the intermediate step of the Giro any more.

       It’s been a very long time since someone has won the Giro two years in a row because often the winner graduates to become a Tour contender.

       Gaudu’s fourth place in the Tour was both a massive result and a burden, the expectations of returning again to repeat or even improve on this have been hard. He came back the following year doing as many W/kg as before but was surpassed. He’s excellent in the mountains but is he really a climber for the long passes or is his niche really 10 minute climbs? Maybe the Vuelta could suit but he doesn’t like the heat although everyone can train for this.

       The idea was to race the Giro without pressure and then see what he could get out of the Tour but easier said than done, his training’s been reduced and it’s a contract year so the Giro won’t be a carefree journey of discovery.

       • “It’s been a very long time since someone has won the Giro two years in a row because often the winner graduates to become a Tour contender.”

         Hmmm. Plain wrong, I’d say, i.e., that’s not the reason, and what you suggest as the reason isn’t much of a fact, either.

         To start with, the Giro isn’t won twice in a row mainly because it’s harder to win. Harder in terms of probabilities, not in terms of watts of course.

         Such a difference in characteristics didn’t factually exist before the 2nd WW due to the nature of the roads, the route, the style of racing etc. but it became increasingly relevant as most roads became asphalted and ITTs were granted growing relative weight, all while commercial factors came into play with growing strength, gradually defining specific race dynamics.
         Of course, that’s also when the TDF became much more important than the Giro, as it turned to commercial sponsors, too.

         So how can you really tell the difference?

         Well, the Giro being more complicated to be won in a row equally happened when the winners were more interested in the Giro itself, and often didn’t even give any shot at the TDF’s GC (be it only because they considered it out of reach, I’m thinking the early 2000s: Di Luca, Savoldelli, Simoni, Garzelli never even dreamt of “winning the TDF” while they clearly went all-in on the Giro; there are several other convincing examples from different decades of course).
         Is it maybe because those athletes weren’t so very strong? Perhaps that might count, even if the field of rivals, at the time, was equally weaker as a whole, so…
         But you can also check back against that conjecture: extremely strong riders who focussed their career on the Giro beyond any reasonable doubt like Gimondi or Saronni still couldn’t win two in a row. Coppi barely made it with a “miracle” of sort on the very last occasion and by a thin margin.

         Now, let’s turn to the “graduate” idea. Of all the winners of the last two decades (but I could go further back), such an idea only applies to two (2) athletes, Carapaz and Hindley. Not exactly what I’d call “often”. Pardoxically, even if you take the most favourable time interval starting with Carapaz’ victory, it’s only 2 out of 6…
         Tao didn’t graduate for anything, sadly enough. I always hope him back to something but it looks like his Giro was a colourful swan of sort. It’s not like that he’d have won any GT whatever had he raced.

         Many winners won the Giro *after* having proven themselves as more than reasonable TDF contenders (or having won it outright). And they’d come back to the Giro, even after they’d get good results at the TDF again. Back and forth, as it’s always been in the history of cycling. Basso, Contador, Menchov, Nibali, Quintana, Dumoulin… A slightly different pattern but no exception for Hesjedal, because he “only” had been 5th at the TDF previously, which anyway was his best result to date in any GT, then was erratic – but truth is that he tried again to fight for GC at the Giro. And Froome, which we could say actually graduated at the TDF in order to be a Giro contender 😉 No need to recall for you the story of Roglic, Pogacar or Bernal.

         • Gabriele writes: “[1945] … that’s also when the TDF became much more important than the Giro.

           Actually, it may surprise you, but in the immdeiate post-war period the Giro probably had more prestige than the Tour. It certainly had stronger fields, and was raced by trade-teams rather than national teams. They were considered roughly equal until the late 1970s: Merckx would have rated them fairly equal. It is only really from the early 1980s that the Tour clearly was the more prestigious of the two races.

           Why did this change happen? There are several reasons I can suggest. (1) After the Coppi-Bartali-Magne generation Italy did not produce a “great” GC rider. In contrast, after 1960 France had Anquetil, Hinault and a bunch of very very good riders such as Poulidor, Thevenet, Fignon. Having the strongest rider in their race gave the Tour more prestige. (2) By the mid-1960s, the organisers of the Giro often became involved in “helping” their local rider win. Examples include 1968 (Gimondi being towed up a mountain) and 1984 (the helicopter etc.). And the course design in some years was “ridiculous”. This discouraged foreign riders from participating. (3) From the early 1980s the Tour actively encouraged foreign team entries and free-to-air highlights in foreign markets. The Giro largely ignored “abroad” in the 1980s and 1990s. The end result was that the Giro has lost prestige.

         • Thanks @John, of course agreeing on most if not all, besides being (un)surprisingly unsurprised here.

           Probably not the best write out from me above, but I didn’t mean that things suddenly changed after WWII, especially in terms of prestige.
           In fact what changed slightly faster, and before the other factor, is – if anything – the TDF becoming (little by little) a less easier to be won in a row, with Bobet mid-50s and then Anquetil, maybe just due to France getting more modern faster.
           As for race prestige, I often quoted here a good deal of work some fans made a time ago cross-checking palmarés, startlist and final top-10 to historically weigh races, and indeed the Giro was “superior” from the 30s included, despite its nationalistic limitations because of political reasons – to mid-60s (subject to many variables which can shift how we weigh such a subtle and gradual process).

           Details and”exact” (never such) dates can be debated, but the scenery is no doubt the one you pictured above.

           Then, we must take into account that change happens in different directions. After the 80s, the Giro regained importance in the 90s (to put it down very simply, Indurain clearly priorised the TDF, as he skipped the Giro as soon as he considered it made the TDF bide at risk, but at the same time he’d be willing year after year *not* to maximise his TDF chance just in order to have a shot *at the Giro*, instead of, say, opting at least once for a home Spring at the Vuelta). The Armstrong years were terrible again for the Corsa Rosa, which then slowly raised its status all the way to the 2010-2019 golden decade, when it often had the best racing and racers (although never more than some 60% of the media impact or the money).

         • “To start with, the Giro isn’t won twice in a row mainly because it’s harder to win. Harder in terms of probabilities, not in terms of watts of course.”

           The last 7 winners haven’t raced the Giro the following year. Seems to me that has nothing to do with probabilities, but more with having other objectives, such as the Tour.
           Of those 7, Bernal and Froome did not race the Tour the following year, but that was because of devastating crashes, but both were scheduled to do the Tour and not the Giro.

       • As for Evenepoel, I’ve some sources who’d assure he’d go both to the Giro and the TDF, hadn’t he had the accident which, as we clearly saw at Romandie, totally ruled out any meaningful participation at the Giro, especially in his situation where he’s always expected to perform.
         As nothing was ever made official, I’ve got no way to prove it.

         However, what you comment above (“Having won the Vuelta he doesn’t need the intermediate step of the Giro any more”) doesn’t make much sense, either, since Remco was a Giro serious candidate (before covid had him out) in 2023 *after* having already won the Vuelta in 2022.

         I’m ready to bet that unless Pogi has a serious drop in performance from this year on, we might see Remco racing at the Giro again at least once in the next 2-3 seasons, even if he doesn’t need that “intermediate step”.
         I could as well be wrong because the terrible way the Italian press behave towards Remco after he DNS might create that sort of mutual hostility which makes it harder to have a rider racing in a foreign country (think Valverde, although he eventually came to collect his due podium), but, as I said, had I to bet, I’d put my money on Remco coming back for a further rosa shot.

         • Gabriele, if I phrase the two statements (about ‘graduating’ and ‘intermediate step’ ) differently, would you agree with the statement? “If a rider wins the (Giro/Vuelta) one year, and this rider is considered the next year to be a likely contender to win either the Tour or the (Giro/Vuelta), they will mostly opt to ride the Tour”. I think that is what is meant with those statements, and it corresponds to my own ideas, but I don’t have the knowledge ready to back it up with data. You are a much better historian of the sport than I am, so I am interested to hear your thoughts on this.

3. I think Roglic still has enough if he can stay vertical (he looked fresh in Catalunya). At the moment though I am thinking more about the sprints in the first half as they could be competitive.
   Any rumours about White’s replacement?

4. “penguins and ostriches” 🙂

   Oft times the most interesting GT though without the tension that surrounds the circus in July. That said not sure this particular cast & route will supply the interest and excitement that the versions in the years from 2016 to 2019 did. I can see a surprise winner along the lines of Ryder Hesjedal. The weather looks to be set fair, currently none of the heavy rain that has been a feature some years, which lessens the chance of “stuff” happening.

   • I hope it’s fun but worry we’ll see riders waiting for others to make mistakes, like Hindley in 2023 and Roglič in 2023 as viewers shout “come on, attack” at their TVs. It’ll be interesting to see how teams play this and form, we’ll know a lot more after a week.

     • Agreed.

       I just *hope* Ayuso isn’t able to hold himself back, even if the final cold shower of Catalunya might have made him more cautious. Carapaz and S. Yates might go along some bold attempt, although their real form is a huge question mark. The course just doesn’t allow much GC action, barring ITTs of course, until the uphill/reduced sprints in Tagliacozzo and Castelraimondo at the end of the first week – not much fantasy to be deployed there, either.
       The sterrati stage will be interesting but more of a random thing, I suspect, so we’ll start to see serious “attitude” (or, more probably, nothing at all) on stage 11. My *hope* is that by then the two ITTs will have created an urge to dare among some strong climbers.

       OTOH, the fight for the stage win or dressing the first maglie rose could be funny, the Albanian stages are nice, as is Matera. The sprinting field looks very good and promisingly entertaining, too, besides being especially adequate for the Giro, with Groves, Kooji, Magnier, Bennett, Pedersen, Van Aert plus in form Moschetti, Kanter and Fretin.

       • I would love to see a wildcard thrown in a la Kuss or BOC in the Vuelta, thus forcing the GC favorites out of their protective shells. I’m not smart enough to try to figure out where or how such a thing would happen, but if it doesn’t I’d have to agree with those above who think it might be a very “wait and see” type of race.

     • To be honest, after 12 months of watching Pogacar and Mvdp (and occasionally others) attacking increasingly ludicrous distances I don’t think I’ll be bothered if attacking is left as little and as late as possible. It’ll be like returning to a familiar old sport I used to know!

   • Another good flightless bird for future ornithological puns/analogies is the Fuegian Steamer Duck, perhaps the most hilarious bird on earth (or on water).

     • This is why I love INRNG. The post contains a beautiful pun and a commenter comes with a piece of obscure knowledge in response, leaving me with a smile and improved knowledge of duck species.

   • I’m hoping that if Roglic and Ayuso aren’t quite on it or lose some time for whatever reason (mechnical, illness, caught in crash etc), there are a few who are now normally on the fringes of the GC race thinking they may have a chance of a GT win (both Yates twins, Carapaz, Hindley, Tiberi). All things being equal, it seems like a two-horse race of experience v youth.

5. I’d have loved to see Carlos Rodríguez in this race. He could be a Bardet of sort, albeit less skinny, stronger in ITTs (and conversely much worse – for now – in one-day racing, not least for a lack of “quantitative” trying).
   But he’s clearly a fondo rider, good descender, crafty, intelligent, creative and bold when required.
   The sort of rider which couldn’t get much from, alas, the Vuelta (even if the Spanish routes are changing, little by little, and definitely for good, which means better terrain for him, too) – and which can easily be crushed by those TDF where things become more of merely athletical test.
   However, it seems he struggles big time under cold weather, which might be an issue at the Giro, indeed.

   • One mirror image thought to this was that if Bernal was back to his best then surely he’d be reserved for the Tour? Hopefully he can get some results out of this to complete the circle of fate he’s endured since winning the race.

     • Speaking of mirrors, having read what you wrote above regarding Gaudu, it’s very curious that Carlos Rodríguez would be technically perfect for the Giro (at least in theory) if only he didn’t struggle under cold conditions, whereas symmetrically Gaudu would be perfect for the Vuelta wasn’t it for the heat…!

     • I disagree about Bernal. Even at his very best, I don’t think he was a match for Pog and Vin, albeit we’ll probably – and sadly – never know what he might have become. His TdF win was very impressive for such a young rider, but until Pinot dropped out injured, Bernal was losing to him, and consistently losing time to him in the mountains, and even in the ITT if memory serves. He eventually beat his team mate, Thomas and Kruijswijk. (This reality seems to have been quickly forgotten among the hype that surrounded a young Colombian who had won the Tour.)
       His Giro win was impressive, and he looked very strong, but again he didn’t beat the best opposition (Caruso and Yates) and not by a large margin.

       I think, like Evenepoel, for Bernal, winning the Giro would be so much more impressive a feat than podiuming in the TdF – mind you, I’d say that for literally any rider. And if Bernal is back to something like his best, this could be possible -and would be welcomed by all, I’m sure.

6. On Tiberi: “his articulate baritone voice is silencing the San Marino sharpshooter story”

   Really?!

   • Yes, he comes across well in the Italian media. I’m sure on the English-language parts of the internet he’s still the cat sniper because it’s the most notorious thing he’s done but he seems to have grown up a lot.

   • As a cat lover and the father of a 19-year-old “adult,” I am willing to give Tiberi a second chance. Young people have been known to make some pretty stupid decisions from time to time.

     • C’mon man. That’s not how the internet is supposed to work!

7. Roglic’s record in GTs is really quite impressive – in his 12 GT appearances since 2019, he’s podiumed in 8 of them (winning 4), and crashed out of the other 4.

   So we can probably quite confidently proclaim that he’ll either podium, or fall over trying!

   • Yes, I agree that his record really is impressive. If he did manage to win (and I agree he is the favourite), then he would be the oldest Giro winner ever. However, this is my personal view.
     Roglic is at the age where his performance can suddenly “drop off”. He will look fine and then, unexpectedly, one-day, he won’t. Whether it happens in the Giro, in the Tour, or not for another year-or-two, we don’t know.

   • Just to correct myself – Roglic has of course won 5 GTs, with 3 other podiums

     • What appeals to me about Roglic is the fact that he came to the sport late and not out of some incubator. His sub-optimal bike handling skills were obvious from the beginning so he has needed a lot of grit.
       Together with that he provides drama … I am on the edge of my seat whenever he reaches for a bidon!

8. I love Bernal’s Colombian national champs Ineos kit – the throwback design to the Cafe De Colombia jersey from the ’80’s is great! Would be nice to see him get a good result and get closer to his best after all he’s been through…

   • I like it too. I wonder if the order went to the factory before the Luis Herrera murder allegations hit the news?

     • Lucho? Say it isn’t so. But to be fair, was always a Fabio Parra fan. Oldest looking man in the peloton.

9. Do we think the lack of summit finishes might make the KOM competition more interesting?

   On GC, I’m not sure I see anyone getting the better of Roglic as long as he stays upright.

   Apparently Van Aert has been sick. Week one looked great for him, but Pedersen looked strong all spring, and if WVA’s been sick, could we see a couple of stages in the opening week for him?

10. I’d put money on Gee or Storer before I’d think some sort of Yates was going to win.

    • I’d take the other side of the bet given both Yates have won World Tour stage races including a grand tour… but it’s not obvious for either side to get the outright win.

      • I’d go with you rather than Cd. But if the main two stay upright and in form none of those 4 will be close to winning.

11. Watch out for Paul Double to win from a breakaway in the mountains! This guy has some form!

    • The trouble is picking the stage, it’d need to be a proper climb to the finish as he won’t be able to solo away on the flat after a mid-stage ascent. Then if the breakaway can make it before Red Bull and UAE mow things down (possible, the Giro should see more space than the Tour), he’ll have to win from the breakaway against a lot of other riders with the same idea for these few days.

      What makes Double more interesting is how he’s got here, that alone is a win after years of gradual improvement. But to use an Aussie phrase, he can climb like a rat up a drainpipe so let’s hope.

      • Haha!! He certainly can!! Agree stars need to align for this to happen and as you say there will be 20 other really good climbers thinking the exact same thing but I do think that they will get an opportunity…….

12. Is “drops the cheese under pressure” a translation of a saying in another language? I love “Red Bull might give them wings but as penguins and ostriches know this doesn’t mean you can fly” and “felled by a feline in February”!

    I’m probably the only person who enjoyed Pogacar’s dominant win at last year’s Giro because it was so much less stressful to watch than, say, the 2020 or 2023 Giros. I couldn’t even bring myself to watch the final TT of the latter. At least this year I’m not particularly bothered as to who wins between Roglic & Ayuso if it does come down to the two of them and it’s unlikely either any British riders or any Ineos riders will be in serious contention for the win, which should help my stress levels. It would be lovely if Bernal could do something but my hopes are low.

    I wish there were more mountain top finishes, with stage 17 a particularly frustrating-looking profile.

    • Dawnstar, the final TT of the 2023 Giro must have been a tough time for you! I must say that I was rooting the other way, but the 2023 Giro and the Watts Occurring podcast changed my mind about old G. I’m really hoping he can find the form to do something exciting for a last hurrah this summer.

    • The organisers want moves to go from further out so fewer summit finishes. But we’ll see, the big mountain stages will be where riders wait.

      Dropping the cheese is an avian allusion to Aesop and the story of the crow and the fox, if Ayuso seems himself as too pretty in pink then hubris can bring nemesis.

      • Another brilliantly literate reference. We’re not worthy! (prostrates himself)

13. Surprised Remco is not riding this, I thought he could do with the racing miles and would have a good chance of the final podium. Guess he’s frying bigger fish in July (no pun intended).

14. @ASB and AK
    What the metaphore about “graduating” implied was made clear by the concept of “intermediate step”, and even more so by the idea that Remco, having won the Vuelta, supposedly “didn’t need” anymore to race the Giro.
    That’s what was being disputed, because I had some inside piece of information suggesting that without accident Remco was probably going to start the Giro this year. Of course, the mere chronology of Remco going for the “maglia rosa” *after* having actually won the Vuelta puts at rest the second part of all the above.

    Now, it’s pretty obvious that the Giro is normally secondary to the TDF, as I made clear above speaking of Indurain or writing that at the very best point of its “resurrection” the Giro had a monetary and media impact of some 60% of the TDF. Add to that the calendar, which means that for most athletes in the training format of the last 30-40 years racing the Giro means reducing your TDF options.
    It’s quite logical that most athletes and teams would priorise the bigger goal.
    Does this bring us any closer to the “graduate” idea which looks like a B-series for juvenile athletes, college sport or the likes? Not at all, as you can see by the mere fact that many cyclists who have already won the TDF, or who have already been very competitive there, consider it fine to park or put at stake their French options a given year (or more) in order to win the Giro, which means that for most educated cyclists it’s clearly a very relevant objective in its own right, although, of course, nobody would swap a specific and real Giro win for a specific and real TDF win. Yet, as I said, several were ready to trade chances, which is not compatible with the “graduate” idea.

    The fact that the last Giro winners weren’t back the following year is a very poor explication. It “explains” why you haven’t back to back victories right now, but it doesn’t explain why we haven’t had them either for more than 30 years since Indurain 1992-1993. Then you need to go further 20 years back to Merckx 1973-1974. During this “short” lapse of time of half a century, you’ve had more than a few occasion when the winner started the following year’s race. Also note that many winners were able to repeat victory, although not back to back (i.e., the reason is not that you’re overwhelmed by random winners).

    Now compare it to the TDF since Merckx. 10 athletes were able to win it more than once – 9 could do it back to back.
    11 cyclists won more than one Giro. Only *two* (2), namely Merckx and Indurain, made it back to back.
    If you counted events not people it would be even more astonishing.

    So, you have a long term manifest trend, but then you spot a contingent series and assume that you have the Big Explainer, the actual reason, even if it won’t work for the whole data set. Good job! Don’t worry, you’re in good company, that’s why a stellar and growing number of scientific articles gets withdrawn fast enough.

    The current situation, if anything, has got some specific causes *in common* with the long term trend, but the latter stays true and, even more important, we’ve got no specific reason to assume that it wouldn’t still working in the current age and time, hadn’t it been “covered” by contingent events.

    The “graduate” idea was put around in the press some years ago, at the end of the 00s (it started with A. Schleck) as a way to “make sense” or “put order” into the calendar with narratives more or less directly borrowed from other sports. It was also a counterfactual defensive reaction to the rise in status of the Giro, which (for a set of different and more or less accidental circumstances) had been priorised by Basso in 2006, Contador in 2008, Sastre in 2009, Evans in 2010, Contador again in 2011. It was a very conflictive moment with other political struggled, leading for example to the Crostis crisis. As always, bad ideas once spread must be then weeded for years and years…

    • Edit re: swapping races, everybody would take the TDF, I mean. Terrible writing out once more.

15. The idea that if you’ve won the Vuelta you don’t need/want to win the Giro is garbage. The Giro is a much bigger race than the Vuelta. And Remco might well never win the Tour, in which case winning the Giro would become even more important. One could even argue that a rider can’t be considered a truly great grand tour rider if he hasn’t won the Giro (true also of the Tour; but the Vuelta?).

    • You are correct on all counts.

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