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Israel Start-up Nation seizes the Giro’s pink jersey in miserable conditions

Alessandro De Marchi uses breakaway to jump into race lead

Photo by: Sirotti
May 11, 2021
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On Tuesday Israel Start-up Nation’s Alessandro De Marchi seized the Giro d’Italia’s pink jersey on a miserable stage in the cold wind and rain. American Joe Dombrowski of UAE-Emirates earned the day’s flowers and took over the mountains jersey. Race leader overnight, Filippo Ganna (Italy/Ineos Grenadiers) dropped away from the GC favourites group with 21 km to race. Egan Bernal, Hugh Carthy, Mikel Landa and Alexander Vlasov put 11 seconds into their rivals.

The Course

In cold rain the peloton would face its first road GC stage. There were plenty of hills, some categorized and most uncategorized. The final climb was the Colle Passerino, 4.3 km of 9.5 percent, peaking 1.5 km from the finish line. The weather was terrible.

For an early Grand Tour breakaway, Tuesday’s escape was enormous: 25 strong, with nine riders under 1:00 from Filippo Ganna’s pink jersey.

The first categorized climb, Cat. 3 Castello di Carpineti, was around the midway point of the 187 km route. By the top, where mountains leader Vincenzo Albanese’s EOLO-Kometa teammate Francesco Gavazzi took the maximum points, the gap was 6:00. Would the big break survive to the end?

Montemolino was the next climb, a 8.5 km, 5.8 percent Cat. 3. According to some escapees, there were too many passengers in the break, and it began to fragment on the way to Montemolino. Two teammates of Monday’s winner Taco van der Hoorn–Quinten Hermans and Rein Taaramäe–flashed off the front with a Bike Exchange Dane, Christopher Juul-Jensen.

The trio started Montemolino with a 1:45 lead on the remains of the breakaway and 8:00 back to the soggy peloton. Taaramäe attacked and only Juul-Jensen went with him. The final two kilometres were very steep and the duo lost a bit of its gap to the chasers. Forty-two kilometres remained.

It was clear there would be two story lines in Tuesday’s conclusion: the Estonian-Danish alliance staying away from the chase group–with the scenario of the Dane taking the stage win and Taaramäe seizing the pink jersey–and the GC favourites scrapping on the final climb.

Colle Passerino

The chase started to edge closer to the duo early on the Passerino. De Marchi, clad in Israel Start-up Nation’s special wine-swirling-in-blackberry-liqueur jersey, and Dombrowski grabbed the Estonian and Dane with 4.5 km to race. The American attacked and De Marchi lit out after him.

In the GC group, Bahrain-Victorious continued to set the pace. João Almeida was in trouble at the back of the pack. Mikel Landa made a dig and Egan Bernal, Alexandr Vlasov and Hugh Carthy came over. They would finish 11 seconds ahead of Remco Evenepoel and Simon Yates.

Dombrowski had to make up 39 seconds on De Marchi to grab the race lead, but he could only come within 22 seconds of pink.

Wednesday’s fifth stage is a pan-flat sprinter’s day.

2021 Giro d’Italia Stage 4
1) Joe Dombrowski (USA/UAE-Emirates) 4:58:38
2) Alessandro De Marchi (Italy/Israel Start-up Nation) +0:13
3) Filippo Fiorelli (Italy/Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) +0:27
126) Antoine Duchesne (Canada/Groupama-FDJ) +23:06

2021 Giro d’Italia GC
1) Alessandro De Marchi (Italy/Israel Start-up Nation) 13:50:44
2) Joe Dombrowski (USA/UAE-Emirates) +0:22
3) Louis Vervaeke (Belgium/Alpecin-Fenix) +0:42
159) Antoine Duchesne (Canada/Groupama-FDJ) +36:27