Giro Competition: The (Inner) Key Ring

I’ve been doing the Inner Ring for over a year now and have landed my first freebie. Mick and Andy from British bike shop Prendas Ciclismo emailed to say they were readers of the site and generously sent a couple of tasteful retro cycling calendars as well as some Giro d’Italia themed keyrings and matching “socks” to store your keys when you go for a ride so they don’t make a hole in your jersey.

They’re quite fun… but “easy come, easy go”. I’m hoarding a couple but now’s your chance to get something for free in a small competition.

Prendas Giro Key ring

Where will Cav finish?
The task is simple: predict Mark Cavendish’s official finishing position for Tuesday’s stage from Termoli to Teramo.

It’s been a tricky race for Cavendish so far. Second to Alessandro Petacchi in the (briefly controversial) sprint on the second stage, there have not been many other chances thanks to several uphill finishes. He seems on form but so is Petacchi and Tuesday’s finish is slightly uphill meaning others will want a say too.

Just leave your pick in the comments below, you can post under a pseudonym but if you leave your email it’ll help me contact you in case you win. It’s that easy and I’ll post the keyring anywhere in the world.

  • Boring small print: the stage starts at 1.30pm Euro time so please be sure to comment before then. Don’t email or tweet as that way all entries are in one place. If several predictions are right then I’ll pick someone at random… and if nobody guesses right then it’s the closest answer that wins.

118 thoughts on “Giro Competition: The (Inner) Key Ring”

  9. Don’t think he will win it, think it will be a flyer out of the bunch but know if predict him not winning he will, so going to go for a double jinx? He will finish 1st!

  16. He’s not really in the shape he should be & Pettachi looks good. And looks a little bit like an uphill finish so I dontthink he can handle it. He’ll be 2nd

  20. Looks like a slight uphill finish. Cavendish finishes 56th and the back sipping espresso.

    Ventoso gets the win ahead of Petacchi.

  22. Odds put Cavendish as favourite, as do the head-to-heads for Cav versus Petacchi for stage 10, so it’s Cavendish for me 😉

  58. He’ll crash within 40m of the line bringing down three other riders and limp across in 154th place. The crash will be his fault (as usual) and he’ll pull out of the Giro and start talking up his chances at the Tour.

  65. 18th, He’ll fight but get run over by the quick guys who can also get uphill a wee bit. Stage 12 is a different matter 😉

  68. Ok – I’m going to make my bid for glory with “last” place. Most likely following a commissaire taking exception to him having the audacity to make a sprint against Italians while in Italy….

  76. So many entries, it’s great to see…and a headache too manage too! Keep ’em coming though.

    I will be using a random formula based on prime numbers and Cav’s date of birth to determine the winner in case of a tie. I’m also interested in the “wisdom of crowds” aspect here, if the average prediction above proves right or not.

  85. Not 1st today. Sorry Cav, you’re great but you struggled up Etna and I think you are saving yourself for the Tour. And..*coughs* I am covering my bases 😉

  88. I don’t want to join the crowd, I also have a feeling something will happen in this stage, maybe a surprise. But I transferred him into my fantasy team for this race so I am going to have go with Cav in 1st place.

  97. The reason why you won’t get ‘the wisdom of crowds’ is because your incentives are a bit off: if you have 10 people guessing ‘1st’, then it makes sense to guess 2nd if you’re the only other player in the game, because that covers 2nd through last via “closest”. If many people start grabbing the higher places, there’s less room for ‘close’ so either you nail it exactly, or you lose out. In that case, you might as well go with something like 50th, in the hopes that he gets shelled up the hill, sits up, and your guess is ‘closest’ to as wide a range as possible.

    Not entirely unrelated to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_law

    I’ll go with 30th.

  107. oh no…thought i said “57th” on my phone this morning but it didn’t go through. i’ll just take the moral high ground in the event of a victory.

  112. Congratulations to:

    Irvin,
    ant1
    David
    David gardiner garcia
    Jez
    Tom
    Rick Chasey
    Mike
    Gary
    Crommy
    Ben Hall
    DJ
    Thomas
    robin
    RMS
    cc_dop
    bikecellar
    Sean Perry
    Phil
    Ronan
    Anonymous
    Cat
    Juanjo
    Baz May
    chris downey
    tadescu
    Mark May

    …for picking Cavendish to win. Now I will use my random formula via spreadsheet to generate a winner… give me a few minutes…

  116. Ha! Today I just received a Santini jersey I ordered from Prendas Ciclismo and what did I find sitting on the counter after I unwrapped the package but a little Giro d’Italia keyring! I neglected to enter the contest, but I still won! Keep up the great work, Inner Ring and fellow posters, and nice win by Cav yesterday.

  117. Pingback: inrng : tour de france giveaway competition
  118. Pingback: inrng : christmas quiz

Comments are closed.