The stage after a rest day often throws up a surprise (not least the Covid +s) and that’s exactly what happened on today’s hilly Stage 10 in the Giro d’Italia. In his maiden Giro, Peter Sagan (Bora) soloed to his long-awaited first victory of the season after going in the day’s breakaway, and holding off the chase from the GC contenders. Brendan McNulty (UAE) was runner-up while race leader Joao Almeida (DSQ) nicked a cheeky four bonus seconds on his rivals to round out the podium.
Stage 14 of Tour de France 2019 was the shortest stage (117.5km) this year but also the first of three mountain stages to finish above 2000m and a big, big test of the GC favourites. This has been one of the most surprising Tours in recent memory and more came today as the peloton drove upwards upwards upwards to the finish at the top of the iconic Col du Tourmalet. To oversimplify it, Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) took the stage win from a tiny group of survivors, but a lot more happened on the way to the summit. So who cracked? Who survived? Who thrived?
The final mountain stage – six categorised climbs including an HC summit finish – and only two riders in the top 10 finished in the place they had started the race in. Yes, Stage 20 was the Vuelta’s version of musical chairs and it was a fitting end to a surprising, spicy and most of all well-fought Grand Tour.