After a long and undulating stage at Tirreno-Adriatico, riders were hit with a brutal climb to the finish, ridden not once, but twice. If the 239km stage wasn’t quite tough enough, gradients of up to 20% would make sure riders finished the day exhausted. Working hard to stay in touch, the UCI World Champion, Peter Sagan, stayed with the leaders in the closing kilometres, but with the specialist climbers setting the pace, it was too much for the Slovak rider. In the overall race, Rafał Majka was caught up in a crash 20km from the finish, and in spite of the best efforts of the team to bring, lost time in the GC standings.
The Stage
Three days in and the race hit its longest stage. At 239km long, the going was always going to be tough, but throw in some climbs over the parcours and it sets the stage for a day where it would be almost impossible to predict what was going to happen. An uphill finish in Trevi meant the pure sprinters would be out of the picture, but the day’s final climb, which was ridden twice on a final 11.4km circuit, wasn’t so tough as to exclude the all-rounders and classics riders, but would also represent an excellent opportunity for the GC riders and climbers to take some seconds. However, gradients of up to 20% in the final kilometre would make the finale wide open – nobody would be comfortable in such a tough finish.
The Team Tactics
The long and undulating stage would make racing difficult. With a lot of kilometres in the team’s legs, it would make contesting the steep finish difficult, especially having already scaled the final climb once already, which would have both a physical and a psychological impact. The plan was to work for Peter and try to position him well for the final circuit, while also working to keep Rafał Majka protected in the GC race, but the unpredictable finish would mean being ready to react to the other teams and their tactics to stay in contention.
The Race
The hilly parcours and the long length of today’s stage didn’t deter riders from trying to get in the break today, with a group of five going off early on. An advantage of more than eight minutes at their peak showed that this group meant business, but with Marcus Burghardt riding at the front for BORA-hansgrohe, it was certain that the time gap was going to drop. The German National Champion pushed hard to reduce the break’s advantage, as well as policing the front of the peloton to pull back any counter attacks. As the finish drew closer, the escapees began attacking each other, the break splintering at the foot of the first climb to Trevi and was quickly swept up by the reduced chasing bunch. After the first ascent saw the size of the peloton shrink dramatically, Peter Sagan hung on as best as he could, but was unable to match the efforts of the stronger climbers on the second climb. Bad luck for Rafał Majka saw him lose time after being caught up in a crash, but the Italian rider Davide Formolo rode hard to keep the team’s overall race alive, finishing the day in the GC top ten.
Results
01 P.Roglic 6h17’23”
02 A.Yates +0:03
03 T.Benoot +0:06
From the Finish Line
“I feel sorry for Rafal. He was in a good position and had good form when the crash happened. We stayed in the front group and had Maciej with him but they couldn’t come back. The final climb today was very steep and going over it twice was hard but I felt I had the legs and went for it. Tomorrow, we have another hard stage with a very tough final climb, 13km with an ascent of 800 meters and parts with 13% gradient. I will have to see how my legs feel and how the other riders measure up and I will try the best I can.” – Davide Formolo
“Our goal today was to go for the stage win with Peter. The squad worked very well to bring him into the best position possible at the start of the final circuit. He was in the front, in the leading group, but the second ascent on the final climb to Trevi proved too hard for him. It was more of a finish for climbers. With 20 kilometres to go, Rafal Majka was, unfortunately, caught up in a crash. He didn’t suffer any injuries but he lost precious time and despite the effort of Maciej Bodnar to bring him back to the GC contenders, he wasn’t able to bridge the gap. Davide Formolo crossed the finish line in the top 20 and is now 8th in the GC, 30 seconds behind the leader. We will work for him in the remaining stages and he will try his chances. Overall, it wasn’t a great day for the team but we have four more stages ahead of us and we will try our best in every single one of them.” – Enrico Poitschke
