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2015 Giro d’Italia Stage 10: Nicola Boem grabs surprise victory from breakaway in Forlì UPDATE

May 19, 2015
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UPDATE: After stage 10 Richie Porte (Australia/Sky) was docked two minutes by the Giro d’Italia jury for accepting an illegal wheel change–from Orica-GreenEdge’s Simon Clarke–and is now 13th on GC, 3:09 in arrears of pink jersey wearer Alberto Contador. Clarke was also given a 2:00 penalty and both were fined 200 Swiss francs.

On a day that should have been a straightforward escape, catch and bunch sprint sequence, Nicola Boem (Bardiani) became the fifth Italian to win a stage of the 2015 Giro d’Italia and the first wildcard victor. Boem was a survivor of a five-man breakaway that somehow eluded the peloton. The other surprise of Tuesday’s stage was Richie Porte (Australia/Sky) losing 47-seconds to his rivals because of a flat with around 5-km to go. Alberto Contador (Spain/Tinkoff-Saxo) kept the pink jersey.

The race was now heading north along the Adriatic coast on the east side of the country, or up the back of the boot. The route was nearly dead flat, with a pimple of a Cat. 4 climb in the middle. Five men scooted away in what seemed like an obviously doomed breakaway, its lineup all-Italian with all four Italian wildcard teams represented. Allesandro Malaguti (Nippo-Vini Fantini) had the distinction of being the first of the 188-riders remaining in the race to cross the Monte di Bartolo.

The quintet never pulled out more than five minutes as IAM and then Lotto-Soudal controlled the pace of the peloton. The sprinters in the peloton weren’t interested in either of the intermediate sprints’ points left over after the escape rolled through. With 20-km remaining the gap was 2:00.

Unfortunately for the fugitives, just as they started to believe they might survive, they lost one of their men to a puncture. Nevertheless, the gap was 1:30 with 10-km to go and 1:00 with 5-km remaining. It was then that Porte suffered a mechanical and needed teammates to help him try to reunite with the peloton.

The quartet ahead began to understand that the day was theirs, even though the peloton continued to exert itself so the sprinters could contest the remaining points. Before some cobbles and a section that was only 7-metres wide, Alan Marangoni (Italy/Cannondale-Garmin) bolted but the other three swamped him and Boem nipped Matteo Busato (Southeast). Boem snagged the red points jersey along with the famous, unlikely triumph.

Nine different riders have won the nine road stages so far.

Rigoberto Uran (Colombia/Etixx-QuickStep) moved up two spots to 6th after Porte’s penalty.

The profile of Wednesday’s eleventh stage looks like a piranha’s jawbone, with many little hills, not all of them categorized. The riders will negotiate three circuits around Imola at the end.

2015 Giro d’Italia Stage 10
1) Nicola Boem (Italy/Bardiani) 4:26:16
2) Matteo Busato (Italy/Southeast) s.t.
3) Allesandro Malaguti (Nippo-Vini Fantini) +0:02
58) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Cannondale-Garmin) +0:18
113) Hugo Houle (Canada/Ag2r) +0:42

2015 Giro d’Italia GC
1) Alberto Contador (Spain/Tinkoff-Saxo)
2) Fabio Aru (Italy/Astana) +0:03
3) Mikel Landa (Spain/Astana) +0:46
21) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Cannondale-Garmin) +6:16
111) Hugo Houle (Canada/Ag2r) +1:32:04