Giro d’Italia 2016: Stage 1 – Dumoulin takes pink

It was a pink day for Dutch rider Tom Dumoulin, as the Giro d’Italia kicked off with an ITT around Apeldoorn, Netherlands. He beat Primoz Roglic (LottoNL-Jumbo) by the slimmest of margins (hundreds of a second!) to take the first maglia rosa. VeloVoices favourite Movistarlet, Andrey Amador, completed the podium.

Rider of the Race

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Tom Dumoulin has picked up where he left off in last year’s Vuelta by throwing down the gauntlet at the start of this year’s Giro d’Italia. This will surely be a great pick-me-up for the Giant-Alpecin team, many of whom are only just getting back into competition after that horrific training accident that put six of them out of commission. How long Dumoulin can stay in pink is up for conjecture – with sprint stages coming up and Marcel Kittel 11secs off the top spot, the Dutch rider should be able to take the jersey into the travel/rest day on Monday if he stays out of trouble and near the front. But that’s for tomorrow. Tonight, he can sleep well, knowing he will be able to bask in the glory of starting tomorrow’s stage – in front of his home country crowd – in glorious pink. It’s a great start to this year’s Giro!

Where are the big GC guys?

Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) finished 16th, just 19secs off the top of the tree. Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) rolled in 24secs down, for the 23rd spot. Sky’s Mikel Landa, however, lost 40sec to Dumoulin to place 67th. While he’s not going to care about where he is in relation to Tom, he most certainly will be disappointed with the 21sec he lost to Nibali. Probably doesn’t bode too well for the other two TTs in this year’s Giro.