The 98th Giro d'Italia has been raced and won with Alberto Contador emerging victorious despite crashing and dislocating his shoulder at the end of stage 6. The Tinkoff-Saxo rider saw off challenges from the Astana duo Fabio Aru and Mikel Landa in the third week having seen Richie Porte (Team Sky) and Domenico Pozzovivo (Ag2r-La Mondiale) withdraw due to injury.
Contador's victory was his second Giro d'Italia success and second straight grand tour having won the 2014 Vuelta a España and will now turn his attention to completing the 'slam' at the Tour de France next month.
The first week of the 2015 Giro witnessed the emergence of young riders such as stage winners Davide Formolo and Jan Polanc, crashes caused by spectators and aggressive race tactics from Astana although it was Contador in pink at the first rest day. The second week of the race saw more jostling for the pink jersey with the stage 14 time trial to Valdobbiadene ending the overall hopes of several riders as Contador put in an impressive effort to distance the likes of Aru and Porte. Stage 16 is a day likely to go down in Giro history for Contador's ride up the Mortirolo, described by Robert Millar as one of "biblical proportions", as Aru cracked and the Spaniard put a down payment on the pink jersey.
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The final days of the race saw Sacha Modolo and Philippe Gilbert claim their second wins of the race before the resurgent Aru as he won back-to-back mountains stages but it wasn't enough to unsettle Contador with his winning margin a comfortable 1:53 minutes.
Relive the Giro through our gallery of the race with all the highlights from San Lorenzo al Mare to Milan over 21 engrossing stages.
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