Giro d'Italia (st. 6)

Gino Mäder (TBV) wins in another rainy day followed by an attacking Bernal (IGD) and Martin (ISN) while Valter (GFC) silently takes the 'Maglia Rosa'. Nelson Oliveira loses his GC position and Marc Soler improves his classification.

The first proper mountain stage of this 2021 Giro d’Italia didn’t let down as we saw a tactical battle for the ‘Maglia Rosa’ under the rain. The 160 km between Grotte di Frasassi and Ascoli Piceno started dry with some break attempts in which Davide Villela and Einer Rubio tried their luck. Eventually a seven men group was formed among which was Dario Cataldo and the rain began.

The break held up with up to 4 minutes of advantage until the descend of the climbs to Forca di Gualdo and Forca di Presta. In that moment Cataldo distanced along with Mollema (TFS), Mohoric and Mäder (TBV), facing a 44km descent in the rain.

The battle for the ‘Maglia Rosa’ had started, Mäder on the break was the main candidate to steal it from De Marchi (ISN), the current leader at that moment, who was losing time with the peloton. IGD accelerated on the final meters of Forca di Presta and Bettiol (EFN), Bardet (DSM) and Ciccone (TFS) attacked chasing the break.

At the bottom of the final climb to Ascoli Piceno the group commanded by Bettiol was caught by the peloton, Cataldo’s group had a little less than 3 minutes with the main group and De Marchi (ISN) was losing more than 9 minutes with the head of the race. Shortly after Mohoric (TBV) finished his job for Mäder and stepped down from the break.

With 4 km to go Marc Soler, Davide Villella, Einer Rubio and Antonio Pedrero were the remaining ‘blues’ on the GC group, Nelson Oliveira couldn’t keep the pace of IGD who took control of the chase. Shortly after Mäder made his move for the stage distancing Dario Cataldo and Mollema, who were caught by the main group thanks to an attack by Bernal (IGD).

Mäder took the stage followed by Bernal, who decided to do the last kilometer full gas, taking Martin (ISN), Evenepoel (DQS) and Ciccone (TFS) with him. Marc Soler fought to close the gap with this group and ended up yielding 15″.

As expected the GC took a tumble, with Nelson Oliveira out of the top 10 and Marc Soler climbing up to the 13th place at 1’14” from the leader and 1’03” from Evenepoel.

Change of scenery for tomorrow’s stage as we will have a rather flat stage with a slightly uphill finish in Termoli, 181 km that will start from Notaresco.

– Start at 12.50 h, finish around 17.00 h; broadcasted by Eurosport 2 and GCN+ starting 13 h.

Cover image (c): BettiniPhoto