It's not how you start, it's how you finish...

The Giro d'Italia's dramatic conclusion erases memories of the cold

Jun 02, 2023

by Lionel Birnie

All roads led to Rome for the Giro d’Italia, if not for our intrepid podcasters, who skipped the final leg in the Italian capital invoking the extreme transfer protocol. The first grand tour of the season came to a dramatic conclusion as Primoz Roglič erased memories of La Planche des Belles Filles on Monte Lussari, turning the tables on Geraint Thomas in the mountain time trial. Then, on Sunday, Mark Cavendish kept up his record of winning a stage of every Giro he’d started. And so, a race that had at times flattered to deceive early on finished on a high note, as we always suspected it would.

With episodes of Explore and The Cycling Podcast Féminin out this week, the regular show will return next week to discuss the Critérium du Dauphiné, kicking off our build-up to the Tour de France. Television’s Daniel Friebe will be on ITV duty at the Tour and so I will be joined at various points by Mitch Docker, François Thomazeau and Ian Boswell. More on our Tour plans in the coming weeks.

Wednesday

Stage winner: Alberto Dainese
Maglia rosa: Geraint Thomas

The profile of the 17th stage to Caorle reminded me – and a few of our listeners – of the downhill stage during the 2020 Tour de France when I announced to Richard and François that I’d be riding from our hotel to the start in Millau, which just happened to be downhill all the way. This led to all sorts of jokes at my expense in the podcast. François suggested there ought to be a king of the descents competition. Richard hooted with laughter when Science In Sport’s CEO, Stephen Moon, on listening to the episode, suggested they make me a duck and butter descending gel.

As for the Giro, it wasn’t the most memorable of stages. There was a break containing three and a Quarterman – another contender for line of the race by Brian – and a sprint victory for Alberto Dainese, who was a surprise winner in Reggio Emilia last year, and continued DSM’s run of delivering better results than many people expect. With Andreas Leknessund’s spell in the pink jersey and a stage win they can count the Giro a success.

There was heartbreak for Intermarché sprinter Arne Marit, whose chain fell off when he was very well placed in the sprint. Daniel captured his tears afterwards and Brian made the point that even when a stage seems boring for the most part there are still individual stories that remind us of the physical and emotional challenge posed by the grand tours.

The culinary cops almost made an arrest when Brian heard a British holidaymaker ask for cheese to go on their pasta vongole. Not wanting to waste the good cheese on seafood, the waiter brought grana, which Brian described as the pro-conti version of parmesan.

Thursday

Stage winner: Filippo Zana
Maglia rosa: Geraint Thomas

After their palaver on Wednesday, when they had to drive part of the way to the press room on the race route and got stuck behind the publicity caravan, Daniel and Brian headed to Palafavera. My play on words in the Pausa Cappuccino fell almost as flat as my revelation that I quite like coffee-flavoured ice cream.

This was the best stage of the race so far, not least because there was the sight of the Italian champion, Filippo Zana, resplendent in his tricolore winning the stage. (National champions are always resplendent, aren’t they?) That alone made the Giro feel more Giro-like. In the absence of any hope of winning the overall classification, it’s not been a bad Giro for the home nation. Stage wins for Jonathan Milan, Davide Bais, Dainese and now Zana. Damiano Caruso carousing into the top five overall and Milan taking a tight grip of the points competition.

There was the revelation that Zana is from Thiene, the same town in north-eastern Italy that Silvia, the voice of our Girovagando jingles, hails from.

The stage itself saw Thomas and Roglič distance João Almeida, turning a three-man race for the pink jersey into a two-man race.

Stacy Snyder’s cups

On the opening day of the Giro, Stacy Snyder’s collection of cups, mugs and gelato bowls sold out in a matter of minutes (as they always do). This year’s design told the story of the 2023 race and featured the traditional trabocchi, the fishing platforms that dot the Abruzzo coastline, and the Colosseum in Rome.

We asked you, our listeners, to nominate a cause to benefit from the money raised from the sale of Stacy’s work and a number of people suggested donating to support people affected by the devastating flooding in Emilia-Romagna, where they experienced six months’ worth of rain in a few days earlier this month.

Friend of the Podcast Paul Heyrman wrote to say that he and his London Dynamo clubmates had entered the Nove Colli gran fondo in Cesenatico, which was cancelled because of the flooding. However, the hotel they’d booked encouraged them to make the trip anyway, on the basis the positive effect of some tourism revenue would outweigh the stress on the region’s services. They travelled and enjoyed a few days of great riding and warm hospitality and suggested the money raised by Stacy’s work be donated to the Emilia-Romagna Flood Fund.

Meanwhile, you may remember that Stacy set aside all of the proceeds from last year’s ceramics, produced for the Giro, Tour de France, Tour de France Femmes and Vuelta a España, for a cause to remember Richard and his legacy. Richard’s widow asked that the money go to Bereaved Children Support, a charity which helps children affected by the sudden loss of a parent or sibling. Last week, thanks to Stacy and every one of our listeners who bought a piece of her work during last year’s grand tours, we were able to donate £8,900 to the charity and we hope it will do a tremendous amount to support children who have lost a loved one.

Friday

Stage winner: Santiago Buitrago
Maglia rosa: Geraint Thomas

Daniel made the very good point that the Giro really ought to spend the best part of a week in the Dolomites because it is the essence of the race in rock formation.

The stage headed over the Passo Giau. Brian gifted Ciro a headline for La Gazzetta dello Sport in the event of an Almeida stage win. Giau Almeida. Ignoring the fact it irons out the subtle ‘wow’ in João, it was a tabloid sports editor’s dream.

Sadly for Ciro’s editors Almeida shipped a few more seconds to Roglic and Thomas. Santiago Buitrago lurked in the breakaway like the shark in a shoal of fish and the Colombian won a Giro stage for the second year in a row. It was perhaps not the most surprising outcome but he nevertheless executed it perfectly. Yes, Buitrago was the best climber up the road – a general classification rider in the making – but there were some classy riders to shake off, including Carlos Verona, Patrick Konrad, Stefano Oldani, Magnus Cort, Derek Gee, and The Cycling Podcast’s Larry Warbasse.

By the time Daniel dialled in for the Pausa Cappuccino it was almost aperitif o’clock. He was at Tre Cime di Lavaredo with Ciro and we conducted a slightly disjointed Tre Cime di Podcasters call in which I failed to ascertain where Ciro would be heading on his post-Giro holiday. To the beach, of course, but which beach?

I got the feeling he was not enjoying his time at altitude – especially as the Dolomites brought back memories of a trip to a Liquigas training camp a decade or so ago when he spent six hours in a team car following Basso and Nibali. Being Nibali’s shadow for so long was not all sunshine and smiles.

Saturday

Stage winner: Primoz Roglič
Maglia rosa: Primoz Roglič

What a stunning finish to the Giro, and our coverage. Yes, there was another stage still to go but the backdrop at Monte Lussari and the conclusion to the race for the pink jersey made the mid-Giro grumbles about the weather and Covid feel like they were part of another race.

Daniel and Brian captured the drama of the stage perfectly and put Roglič’s victory into context. Sport is all about triumph and disaster and the Slovenian’s win would not have been as spectacular were it not for the mirror image of La Planche des Belle Filles and the 2020 Tour de France.

Both Roglič and Thomas had endured disaster at the Giro before. Roglič had also enjoyed happy days, such as his breakthrough victory in the Chianti wine trial in 2016 and a spell in the pink jersey in 2019. What had looked at one stage to be a nailed on victory unravelled spectacularly on the road to Como when Roglič crashed and his team car was nowhere to be seen because they had stopped so sports director Jan Boven could answer the call of nature.

Thomas, meanwhile, had ridden the Giro four times before. The first two were in the Olympic years, 2008 and 2012, and served as a big chunk of endurance work before he switched to the track to win team pursuit gold medals for Great Britain. In 2017, he crashed on the road to Blockhaus when Wilco Kelderman clipped a motorcycle that had stopped on the side of the road to let the peloton pass. Thomas tumbled down the general classification that afternoon but bounced back after the rest day to finish second to Tom Dumoulin in the time trial. It was but a brief recovery because three days later he went home.

In 2020, there was more bad luck. Thomas crashed spectacularly in the neutral zone in Enna when they clattered over some cobblestones and a bouncing bidon went under his wheels. He got up and rode all the way to the top of Mount Etna knowing his overall hopes were over. He’d fractured his pelvis. Thomas pulling out paved the way for Tao Geoghegan Hart to emerge as the Ineos leader and eventual Giro winner.

How strange that two-and-a-half years on, it was Geoghegan Hart – who looked to be in the form of his life – who crashed out leaving Thomas as the sole Ineos contender for the pink jersey. I wonder how different the final week of the race would have been had both Thomas and Geoghegan Hart been in contention. This is one of those questions to which we will never have an answer.

Sunday

Stage winner: Mark Cavendish
Maglia rosa: Primoz Roglič

And so our Girovagando came to an end. There was a fairytale finish for Mark Cavendish in the Eternal City. Daniel and Brian decided, wisely, not to make the 700-kilometre journey to the capital, recording their final episode before saying arrivederci at Padova train station where il barone boarded the Orient Express for his journey home.

All that remains is for us to say a few thank yous. We couldn’t produce our grand tour coverage without the team of brilliant people who help us keep the show on the road.

Daniel and I would like to thank all of the following…

Brian Nygaard for lending us his voice and knowledge of cycling, Italy and, yes, wine, for the past three weeks. I sensed that he wasn’t too sure about his nickname – il barone – at first, but let me assure him, and everyone, it was deeply affectionate, as all the best nicknames are.

Larry Warbasse and Ciro Scognamiglio and everyone who joined us along the way.

Our producers Adam Bowie, Will Jones, Jon Moonie, Huw Owen and Tom Whalley. In an age of media on demand, it’s perhaps easy to underestimate the skill and speed required to create each episode within hours of the stage finishing. They then find the energy and ingenuity to add their creative flourish to Kilometre 0 as well.

Our sponsors Science In Sport and MAAP, whose support plays a huge part in enabling us to cover the three grand tours on the road.

The brilliant Amaraterra for again providing the soundtrack to our Girovagando journey.

David Luxton and everyone at DLA for helping everything to run smoothly behind the scenes.

Greg, Luciana and everyone at D Vine Cellars for curating the Girovagando collection of wines to accompany the race. The case of six wines is still available here.

And most importantly, all of thanks to you – our listeners – and especially our Friends of the Podcast subscribers who help in such an important way to fund our coverage. If you’d like to support us, or want to listen to the additional episodes, sign up here,

An ode to Derek Gee

And finally… Ralph Wilson wrote to us with a poem written by his friend Jez Cox (not the Eurosport-GCN commentator, another one). Jez was apparently too modest to send it himself but Ralph felt his ode to Derek Gee deserved a wider audience, and we agreed. So here it is, a tribute to the revelation of the Giro, a man who spent more than 800 kilometres in the breaks…

And people will ask,
"Was it Thomas, Roglic, Almeida, of that peerless trio;
Who rode with such verve, boldness, brio?"
Well indeed the victor from those demigods rose;
But another stole our hearts, one of the heroes.

It was the lowly velodrome from whence he hailed;
But the high mountains where he near prevailed.
Though stung more than once by 'The Eternal Second',
He wore that curse as if be-weaponed;

For who really conquered the Giro in 2023?
It was the wondrous, mighty Derek Gee!

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The 11.01 Cappuccino

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