The second pick of the season is the Giro d’Italia’s penultimate stage on the Colle delle Finestre.
Several riders are close on the overall classification. The finish in Rome is days away but the contenders are cautious, all hoping someone else will crack while fans grow impatient, willing them to attack. This has been the story of the Giro for the last few years. It sounds better than the early settled outcome of the Tour de France recently but it’s been a frustration. The mark of a really good race would be to see the contenders gain and lose time and then recover, all while the pink jersey changing shoulders several times during the last week. This year’s Giro felt the same until the last mountain…
Isaac Del Toro took the maglia rosa after the stage to Siena where he was away with Wout van Aert. The Belgian got a redemptive win, the Mexican got questions about his abilities and leadership: how far could he go?
Almost all the way. Team mate Juan Ayuso had crashed in the Albanian start but still took the first summit finish in the Apennines but then the contenders started to drop away. Primož Roglič and Juan Ayuso started as joint favourites but would leave and several others fell by the wayside from Jai Hindley to Antonio Tiberi.
Richard Carapaz had the momentum in the final week in the Alps but his moves were only gaining seconds here and there and compensating for losses elsewhere. He started the final mountain stage second overall at 43 seconds down on Del Toro, with Simon Yates 1m21s down.
A big break went early and kept swelling as more riders jumped across and among the last to make it was Wout van Aert. It was ok to let him in the move, but UAE and EF made the mistake of letting the break take almost ten minutes which meant Van Aert might be able to get up and over the Finestre and to relay Simon Yates on the valley road to Sestriere. If Yates was there of course.
EF launched Richard Carapaz on the early slopes of the Finestre, they had to because the squad doesn’t have climbers able to last longer into the climbs and it was a good tactic too to put Del Toro under pressure from the start rather than let UAE hypnotise everyone into a slumber.
Del Toro followed, he had to. This set up a duel, Carapaz attacking over and over but he could not shake Del Toro. Then Simon Yates quickly bridged across. He attacked the Latin American duo almost immediately, then went again and again. The fourth time was lucky, an incisive move tracking the inside line of a bend as he went away.
Yates started to open up space. This might have given him psychological boost while Carapaz had the mental burden of Del Toro on his wheel. His every attack only saw the maglia rosa winch his way back to Carapaz’s rear wheel. Crucially this is where Del Toro stayed, he was marking Carapaz rather than chasing Yates who was now taking plenty of time, and climbing the Finestre in record time.
Yates was virtual maglia rosa over the top of the Finestre and soon found Wout van Aert ahead. This was precious help but by now the gap was made and Del Toro and Carapaz were stuck with each other. They conceded the race to Yates, at times sitting more upright on the descent than during the climb, arms straight rather than elbows bent.
It should also be mentioned that Chris Harper took the stage, one of those days when the stage winner gets forgotten because of all the action behind.
Why the highlight?
No point trying to explore too much subtlety, watching Carapaz attack Del Toro on the early slopes of the Finestre was great. We often use the word “attack” when we really mean acceleration but Carapaz’s moves were all aggression and his flurry of attacks was dramatic to watch.
Was it good tactics? This only made it better, you could admire the audacity of Carapaz and the poker play of Del Toro while able to see the story could go either way.
Seeing the pair away and the race reduced to a duel was dramatic, then the giant plot twist as Simon Yates bridged across and then took on the pair. Watching on Italian TV there were time checks and mentions of Van Aert but Eurosport apparently didn’t report likewise which probably heightened the drama for many when the Belgian appeared on screen having crested the Finestre in time to wait for Yates.
Also it was all good sport. Carapaz and Del Toro did raise the white flag on the road to Sestriere but nobody lost because of a crash or a puncture.
With hindsight
The best overall contest for GC in a grand tour this year? It wasn’t a vintage year but thanks to this stage which saw the overall classification overturned on the last go the Giro probably wins because the order was upturned but the Tour merits a second look for the sheer number of attacks and the revelation that Pogačar had a sore knee in the Alps might have Visma kicking themselves; but absent a diagnosis the assumption is that Pogačar was always on course to win.
Del Toro went into the Giro as a promising rider and came out as a grand tour contender. His rise partly explains Ayuso’s exit to Lidl-Trek; to renew Del Toro’s contract in the wake of the Giro came at a cost for UAE, releasing Del Toro meant a saving. The Mexican went onto to have a superb follow-up, the Tour of Austria in July, Burgos in August, top-10s in the Worlds road race and TT, a slew of Italian autumnal classics and then the Mexican championships for dessert. But is he a grand tour contender? This feels a bit picky but it’s something to look forward to in 2026 because his only real weakness in the season was in the high mountains after repeated, long climbs. Is this his frontier or just an area to improve on? All the incentives in the sport learn towards working on this so expect more.
Yates’ win at the age of 32 shows patience works too, poetry too as he won on the Finestre where he’d been sacked in 2018. Visma-LAB won and in part thanks to their collective strength and budget, having Van Aert up the road is a luxury other teams don’t get. But the Giro almost went to EF and shows that other teams can get a look-in.
Del Toro and Yates enjoyed results after the Giro but it was notable how others struggled. Roglič first among them. Antonio Tiberi and David Gaudu were both ill but pressed on with the Giro and this was probably a mistake.
A sum up is a sum up but leaving totally out of the picture San Valentino actually shapes a different narrative, because Del Toro lost 1’36” to Carapaz on that single day. Not exactly small change. S. Yates also lost 42″ and really only Pellizzari and Gee were within 30″ to Carapaz.
Plus, the fact that Bormio or Castelnovo ended up with one of the final two podium contenders winning each but, as said above, with a reduced time gap, doesn’t actually mean that they weren’t moving on the big climbs away from the line – it’s different if things come together, esp. as it happens thanks to intense team action by GC teams or, well, a supreme Pedersen, versus nothing happening at all barring bare breakaways.
Trading attacks among equals isn’t the same as a waiting game.
I wonder if the commenters who share the sensation of too much waiting really had been watching those stages for the last 3 hours or so, or if they had chosen the typical “last 60-90 minutes” format.
Or… if they had been watching the 2022 Giro, a true waiting game barring Blockhaus, Torino (and Marmolada).
And I also think that the above (slightly) underestimates the importance of WVA, esp. though not excl. in “indirect” tactical terms (as in chasers knowing they now had it lost, or not, i.e. Carapaz being aware of the situation unlike Del Toro, with resulting conflicting expectations), something which was debated here back then (I think).