Although the queen stage today did not crest the 2618m high Gavia pass, as was previously planned, the parcours was no less challenging.
Cycling tourists checking out the conditions on the Gavia
Due to the continued avalanche risk as well as icy roads, the race organizers designated an alternative route. The new parcours traversed a distance of 194km and approximately 4800 vertical meters. The riders took to the start in Lovere, as originally planned, however then crossed two uncategorised climbs before cresting the 10.6km-long and 5.9 per cent steep ascent up to Cevo. Following on from that, the peloton rode through Edolo, then turned westward up to Aprica and from there, descended down into the Adda Valley before heading up to climb the fearsome Mortirolo.
Having had already 154 km in the legs, the 11.9km-long and on average 10.9 per cent steep ascent saw many riders struggle. After a steep and sinuous descent, the road gradually went uphill once more for the final 10km until the finish in Ponte di Legno. A 21-man strong breakaway was able to gain an advantage of more than 5 minutes during the first half of the race. The main field, lead by Movistar, did not attempt to reel the group of escapees back in a hurry, and the race situation remained unchanged for a long time.
On the start of the climb to the Mortirolo, the breakaway was reduced to a small group of riders. While back in the main field Movistar once again made the pace but the advantage of the leaders remained around 5 minutes.
With 34km to go V. Nibali attacked and some of the favorites had to drop back. H. Carthy was able to catch up with the Italian rider but the breakaway still had 5 minutes on the chasers. The group around the Maglia Rosa was about 20 seconds behind the chasing duo.
Shortly before the top of the mountain it started to rain, making the upcoming descent even more treacherous. At this point the chasing group with the Maglia Rosa and V. Nibali was still four minutes behind the leading duo. The wet roads and poor visibility prevented the chasers from taking risks in the descent of the Mortirolo and the race situation remained unchanged. With 5km to the finish, the chasing group of V. Nibali and the Maglia Rosa had a gap of less than 3 minutes to the leading duo. At the end of a terribly difficult day, G. Ciccione won the stage ahead of his breakaway companion J. Hirt.
Stage Result
01 G Ciccione 5:36:24
02 J. Hirt +0:00
03 F. Masnada +1:20
04 V. Nibali +1:41
20 D. Formolo +4:46
21 R. Majka +4:46
From the finish line
“I lost time today and I don’t quite know what went wrong, but I had bad legs on the Mortirolo. I hope that it is just one bad day, and there are more stages yet to come. Michael Schwarzmann did a very good job, and Davide Formolo supported me extremely well on the Mortirolo. We tried to make up time in the descent, however we eventually weren’t able to do that successfully. It was a hard day in the saddle, and I think that everyone suffered out there. Now we will have to see how we fare tomorrow.”
– Rafal Majka
“The day after the rest day is always critical at a Grand Tour, especially when it is a mountain stage with torrential conditions like we had today. We planned accordingly, however, Rafal had a worse day in the saddle than we would have liked. We had Davide Formolo there to help him, and he was to stay with him to support him, even though we expected that the leading group would have a good chance of making it on today’s stage. In the end, Rafal had a difficult day in the saddle, however, Davide deserves particular mention for the work that he did for his teammate, accompanying him the whole day. We should also mention Michael Schwarzmann, who was able to assist, coming back from the breakaway group. At the end of the day, we lost some time, and Rafal slipped back to 6th position overall. However, we’re assuming that this was only one bad day, and that he’ll bounce back. We’re now looking with confidence to tomorrow’s stage, and then we’ll be able to gauge the situation better.”
– Christian Poemer, Sports Director
General classification after stage 16
1 Richard Carapaz (Ecu) Movistar Team 70:02:05
2 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Bahrain-Merida 0:01:47
3 Primoz Roglic (Slo) Team Jumbo-Visma 0:02:09
4 Mikel Landa (Spa) Movistar Team 0:03:15
5 Bauke Mollema (Ned) Trek-Segafredo 0:05:00
6 Rafal Majka (Pol) Bora-Hansgrohe 0:05:40
7 Miguel Angel Lopez (Col) Astana Pro Team 0:06:17
8 Simon Yates (GBr) Mitchelton-Scott 0:06:46
9 Pavel Sivakov (Rus) Team Ineos 0:07:51
10 Jan Polanc (Slo) UAE Team Emirates 0:08:06
