Today's stage: 177 km stage with 3 climbs on it and a brutal final finishing kick with a 27% gradient on one part over cobblestones.
Who won today's stage? Joaquim 'Purito' Rodriguez (Katusha) was seemingly made for this kind of stage (or the stage was made for him...) and he won easily on the final climb.
What matters in the GC race? Rodriguez is now the overall leader after previous leader Sylvain Chavanel (QuickStep) was dropped on the finishing hill and lost over a minute. Chavanel is still 8th overall, but he is no threat for overall victory. Rodriguez's teammate Daniel Moreno is now 2nd overall, 32 seconds behind, followed by day one leader Jakob Fuglsang and defending champion Vincenzo Nibali.
What matters in the other competitions?
Green Jersey (Points, Sprinter Competition) – Rodriguez regained the lead in this competition with his stage win and is emerging as the most likely winner given the lack of sprint finishes and the number of summit finishes to help him out. Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Cannondale) is second and will wear the jersey tomorrow.
Polka Dot Jersey (King of the Mountains) – Moreno retains his lead and his jersey, but Matteo Montaguti (Ag2r La Mondiale) was in the breakaway and has moved into a tie. Moreno wins the tiebreaker because of
White Jersey (Allround) – Moreno is also the leader here, followed by Rodriguez. Former leader Chavanel will wear the jersey tomorrow given his 3rd place standing and riders in front of him wearing other more important jerseys.
Biggest surprise: Igor Anton (Euskatel) revived a bit. The prerace co-favorite had a few awful days and dropped out of the running for the overall victory. I thought he would continue to drop big time until after the rest day on Tuesday, but he finished 6th on the stage, beating many of the favorites including Nibali.
Biggest disappointment: Nobody even bothered to challenge Rodriguez and his Katusha team. Katusha controlled the entire stage and there was never anything other than a feeling of inevitability from the beginning today. With the exception of one ill-timed move at the foot of the final hill by Michele Scarponi (Lampre-ISD), nobody even made a significant attempt to stay with Rodrgiuez. All were trying stay on Rodriguez's wheel and not lose time instead of trying to gain time. Considering many of these same riders did the same thing and got destroyed by Alberto Contador at the Giro d'Italia, one would think they would try something different.
Other items of note: Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Cervelo) surprisingly took the start today, but he was forced to abandon early in the stage because he was coughing up blood... Oscar Freire (Rabobank) also abandoned because of his lingering sickness that had plagued his preparation and the first few stages of the race... The intermediate sprint points were both in odd places. Both were on uncategorized climbs late in the stage and were absorbed by the breakaway... Also interesting was the presence of late uncategorized climbs that blew the field up anyway. Had they been in the Tour de France, they likely would have been cat. 3's.
What is coming tomorrow? More opportunity for time gains and losses with a summit finish. Before the big mountain, the stage is largely undulating but not overly difficult.
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