2015 Giro d’Italia route unveiled in Milan
The organizers of the Giro d’Italia revealed the course for the 98th edition of the race Monday in Milan with several top riders on hand for the ceremony. Cadel Evans, on the verge of retirement, received a special presentation on stage.
The 2015 Giro d’Italia will run from May 9-31 counter-clockwise around the country, reaching as far south as Naples and visiting Switzerland on its 3481-km journey from San Remo to Milan. There are two time trials including the longest Grand Tour individual chrono since Denis Menchov’s 2009 victory over 60.2-km, seven medium mountain stages, five high mountain days and seven opportunities for the sprinters.
Act One: The traditional opening day team trial is set in San Remo along a 17.6-km coastal bike path. After a sprinter’s day, the race gets hilly as it heads into the Apennines. Stage 5 to Abetone features the first uphill finish. The eighth stage is considered the first high mountain day, with a summit finish on Campitello Matese near Naples. After another hilly affair on stage 9 comes the first rest day.
Act Two: There’s a kicker to the Stage 12 finish in Vincenza, and a high mountain summit is the terminus of Stage 15, but the middle week is dominated by the 59.2-km individual time trial from Treviso to Valdobbiadene. It’s a long, rolling route with an uphill finish. Week two is where the sprinters can get their mojo working, especially on Stage 13, which has the flattest profile I’ve ever seen.
Act Three: Once again the organizers have back-loaded the event. There are three high mountain summit finishes in the last six stages. Stage 16 rolls over the famed Mortirolo on its way to the long, mild Aprica climb and makes a claim for queen stage status. Three days later, and after an arrival in Lugano, Switzerland, the course heads up the Aosta Valley, clambering up two Cat. 1 climbs before finishing on the Cervinia, also known as the Matterhorn.
Stage 20 has been dubbed the queen stage, and it will certainly be a day of reckoning.
Like stage 16’s Mortirolo penultimate climb upstaging the final ascent of Aprica, the Cimma Coppi climb up the Colle delle Finestre will overshadow the 2015 Giro’s final mountain of Sestriere. The Fenestre is long, steep and the top half is unpaved. Someone’s GC hopes will become undone on this stage.
The final day is a flat one to rival Stage 13 in profile, a 185-km procession from Torino to Milan.
Alberto Contador has thrown his casquette into the ring and his team’s owner, Oleg Tinkoff, has challenged Contador’s rivals to follow the Spaniard’s Giro-Tour de France program. We will find out in the next few months whether Chris Froome, Vincenzo Nibali will contest the corsa rosa. Nairo Quintana has already reserved himself for the Tour.
