Giro d'Italia Stage 15 - Rodriguez back in pink and Cunego is crazy

Today's stage: Another high mountain day with a summit finish. This one only finished atop a category 2 climb, not that that means anything in the Giro d'Italia.

Who won today's stage? Matteo Rabottini (Farnese-Vini) led from the breakaway from 18 km. He crash on a descent. He was caught by new overall leader Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) in the final km. And he won the stage anyway by outsprinting Rodriguez.

What matters in the GC race? Ryder Hesjedal's (Garmin) second stay in the pink jersey was short as he was dropped on the final climb by Rodriguez and now trails by 30” overall. Beyond him, nody else now sits within a minute. Ivan Basso (Liquigas) is 3^rd and the Astana pair of Tiralongo and Krueziger are 4^th and 5^th.

What matters in the other competitions? - Note this section will be completed as best as possible but will be incomplete due to time constraints.

Red Jersey (Points) – Rodriguez scored more points to tighten his grip on second place today. Notably, Mark Cavendish (Team Sky) finished inside the time cut yesterday and then got 3^rd place at the early intermediate sprint in his hunt to score enough points to win this competition.

Blue Jersey (King of the Mountains) – Michel Golas (Omega Pharma QuickStep) can't climb high mountains. That doesn't matter. He still leads right now. The most likely winner right now is yesterday's stage winner Andrey Amador (Movistar) who has shown decent climbing ability and an ability to get into nearly every breakaway or major chase group to chase points.

White Jersey (Best Young Rider) – Sergio Henao (Team Sky) put some distance between himself and teammate Rigoberto Uran. With Damiano Caruso (Liquigas) working for Ivan Basso and Peter Stetina (Garmin) working for Ryder Hesjedal, this is a teammate battle from here.

Biggest surprise: Rabottini had something left in the tank to take the sprint. When Rodriguez caught and passed Rabottini, it looked like curtains. Then Rabottini found another wind and sprinted past Rodriguez to keep his deserved stage win.

Biggest disappointment: Damiano Cunego (Lampre) was thought (or ok, he thought in his own mind) that he was an overall contender in this race. This would be fine, except his teammate Michele Scarponi is the defending champion and sits in 6^th overall. Not that this matters to Cunego. He just does what he wants. If he worked for his team instead of trying crazy attacks like yesterday and today, both himself and his teammate Scarponi would be in better shape. Case in point, Scarponi attacked today. Cunego was up the road but had no energy to help. Scarponi blew by like nothing was happening and then cracked himself. Both lost time today. Had Cunego just stayed with the bunch, the 1-2 attack could have worked, but that's not possible for Cunego. In reality, it never has been. When he won the Giro, Cunego basically stole the team leadership on the road from teammate Gilberto Simoni. He has tried these things ever since, and it has never worked.

Other items of note: Robert Gesink (Rabobank) showed in the Tour of California that he is all the way back from his broken femur suffered last season. He won the Mt. Baldy queen stage and will win the Tour of California today. Giving himself tons of momentum going into the Tour de France... There were mass abandonments today in the Giro. Most notably, Frank Schleck abandoned (Shocking I know) citing should pain.

What is coming tomorrow? A much deserved rest day followed by a possible sprint stage for Cavendish (and believe me it will be Cavendish as most of the other sprinters have gone home).