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100th Giro d’Italia Stage 14: Commanding win by Dumoulin on Oropa pads his lead

Quintana can't budge the pink jersey on summit finish

Tom Dumoulin looks more likely to win the Giro d’Italia after the pink jersey holder won on Saturday’s summit finish at Oropa. He shut down his main rival Nairo Quintana’s attack and won in a sprint, padding his lead. Dumoulin also won Stage 10. The Butterfly of Maasticht leads the King of the Mountains competition as well.


The Course

Saturday’s stage was short at 131-km. Following a tribute to Fausto Coppi in Castellania, the riders’ neutralized section was a downhill before a flat 103-km. After a gentle slope of 13-km, the 11.8-km, 6.2% haul to Oropa began.


In 1999 Marco Pantani took a famous victory on Oropa while wearing the maglia rosa, before a high hematocrit reading saw him tossed from the race and precipitated his tragic downfall.

The Escape

Several escapes–including one with Michael Woods–fizzled before a trio managed to get some traction at the 30-km mark. Its leash was kept short.


The fugitives were corralled with 17-km to go on the gradual slopes. Trek-Segafredo, with 3rd place Bauke Mollema in mind, cracked the whip. Plenty of slicing and dicing marked the front of the peloton before the roads narrowed. At first Movistar was very chill.

Oropa

Finally, Movistar went to the front, prompting Diego Rosa of Sky to attack on the flatter part of the climb. Movistar kept Rosa in sight and brought him back just as the tougher top half of the ascent began.

Dimension Data’s Igor Anton took a swing with 5.5-km to go. This prompted an acceleration from Katusha’s Ilnur Zakarin, with Adam Yates grabbing the Russian’s wheel. Poor old Tejay van Garderen trickled off the back of the favourites group. Then the front was all back together as Movistar’s Winner Anacona turned himself inside out.

When Domenico Pozzovivo attacked Quintana turned on the jets to retrieve him. Both Mollema and Bob Jungels lost contact. Quintana pulsed again, this time with Zakarin and then carried on alone. But he didn’t get a huge gap and Dumoulin did the work to bring Mikel Landa, Vincenzo Nibali, Yates and Zakarin back to Colombian. Thibaut Pinot, Steven Kruijswijk and Pozzovivo were a little farther back.

As soon as Dumoulin and company reached Quintana, the Dutchman accelerated, dropping Nibali. Only Landa, Zakarin and Quintana were with him going into the last couple of kilometres. Within sight of the line Dumoulin dropped the hammer and dispatched Quintana, who was fourth, losing 14-seconds.

Pinot pushed Mollema off the podium and now Nibali is the closest to the Frenchman in the competition for the final podium place.

Michael Woods was 77th, 7:41 back and is now 30th in GC.

Sunday is a medium mountain stage with a Cat. 2 and Cat. 3 in close proximity in the latter third of the route. A short climb comes just before the finish in Bergamo.

2017 Giro d’Italia Stage 14
1) Tom Dumoulin (The Netherlands/Sunweb) 3:02:34
2) Ilnur Zakarin (Russia/Katusha) +0:03
3) Mikel Landa (Spain/Sky) +0:09
77) Michael Woods (Canada/Cannondale) +7:41
162) Svein Tuft (Canada/Orica-Scott) +14:38

2017 Giro d’Italia GC
1) Tom Dumoulin (The Netherlands/Sunweb) 59:31:17
2) Nairo Quintana (Colombia/Movistar) 2:47
3) Thibaut Pinot (France/FDJ) 3:25
30) Michael Woods (Canada/Cannondale) +28:08