Michael Woods earns third place at Giro dell’Emilia
Canadian was also runner-up in 2019
Photo by: SirottiMichael Woods started his autumn Italian race campaign with third place in Saturday’s 1.Pro-rated Giro dell’Emilia, a competition in which he came runner-up in 2019. Saturday’s lineup was stellar, but the top man in Bologna, Italy was Primož Roglič, who powered to his second title.
The Course
There were two longer climbs in the middle of the course, but the key ascent was the 1.8 km, 10.7 percent San Luca on each of the five circuits that concluded the 194.5 km affair.
We are at the start of the #GirodellEmilia today, one of the oldest races in the calendar, which puts on the table the well-known demanding parcours revolving around the short but hard San Luca climb. pic.twitter.com/nZ9YGksHXu
— Deceuninck-QuickStep (@deceuninck_qst) October 2, 2021
Remco Evenepoel’s attacking on the San Luca circuits set up the select group of Woods, Roglič, Adam Yates and Evenepoel’s teammate João Almeida, in one of his last races with Deceuninck-Quick Step.
When it came to the sprint, Roglič was the strongest and Almeida was runner-up for the second year in a row. Woods edged out Yates to round out the podium.
Woods hasn’t finished below fifth place in his last three races, including fifth in the Olympic Games road race and fifth in the Tour of Britain. He’ll contest the 100th Tre Valli Varesine on Tuesday, perhaps Wednesday’s Milano-Torino–which he won in 2019–and most likely the final 2021 Monument Il Lombardia on Sunday.
2021 Giro dell’Emilia
1) Primož Roglič (Slovenia/Jumbo-Visma) 4:54:26
2) João Almeida (Portugal/Deceuninck-Quick Step) +0:03
3) Michael Woods (Canada/Israel Start-up Nation) +0:05