Today's stage: A climb fest ending on Austria's highest mountain, the Grossglockner.
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| Jose Rujano celebrates his victory while Alberto Contador follows him in. Photo courtesy velonews.competitor.com |
Who won the stage? Jose Rujano of the Androni Giocattoli team was able to stay with race leader Alberto Contador and was gifted the stage win by the stronger Contador after helping him extend his overall lead over the main contenders.
What matters in the GC race? Contador now leads by over three minutes. Barring something insane happening, this race is over even with the killer climbs remaining. Contador can now likely survive a bad day and still win the race. Vincenzo Nibali is now second, a position where he will likely finish considering he is the favorite on stage 17, a mountain stage with a descent finish, and the time trial where he figures to be strong. Michele Scarponi remains just four seconds behind Nibali for second place.
Biggest surprise: Contador attacked today. Considering this was thought to be a breakaway stage with the GC men sitting out waiting for the killer stage (more on that later) tomorrow, the favorite and race leader was considered among the least likely to attack.
Biggest disappointment: Other teams did all the work in chasing down the breakaway giving Contador an incentive to attack for the time bonus. Not much could be done about Contador's dominance so far. He has been that good. Even so, this has been a pathetic tactical race by the race of the field and they are paying for it every time the road turns mountainous.
Other items of note: The epic Monte Zoncolan stage tomorrow will be a little less epic after the controversial and dangerous Monte Crostis climb was removed from the race route after racing finished today. Oddly, it was not for safety concerns, but for competition concerns. The UCI (a bunch of morons governing a sport if there ever was one) forced the change because of the inability for team cars to get onto the pass in the event of mechanical failures. Oh really. Tom Boonen would like his chance to win Paris-Roubaix back then considering he flatted in the Arnberg Trench where team cars are not allowed and never caught the main filed again. Dropped for safety fine. The descent of Monte Crostis is stupid dangerous. For competition reasons you have to be kidding me. Meanwhile in California, Dave Zabriskie won the Solvang Time Trial at the Tour of California and Chris Horner had his lead chopped by Levi Leipheimer. I will be at tomorrow's queen stage climb up Mount Baldy so expect a longer Tour of California entry tomorrow.
What is coming tomorrow? Monte Zoncolan. Even without Crostis, Zoncolan is a fearsome proposition. It is a beast of a climb where time gaps can be absolutely huge.
Any GC changes tomorrow? Contador will still lead. Behind him is anybody's guess. All positions are up for grabs on one of the most difficult climbs in Europe. Chris Fontecchio on podiumcafe says the climb is hard to describe without using profanity. And that's before you realize there are gravel sections too. I expect Contador to retain his top spot and Nibali to remain second since he does a good job of not overriding and cracking on climbs. The rest, who the heck knows? All I know is the top ten will likely look very different tomorrow night.
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