The 17-kilometre haul out of Castel di Sangro to Roccaraso has been conquered by the likes of Fausto Coppi (1953), Bernard Hinault (1980) and Moreno Argentin (1987) at the Giro d’Italia, but the current holder of the maglia rosa, Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin), seems unperturbed by the Abruzzese climb on the eve of the first summit finish of this year’s race.
Dumoulin fulfilled expectations by landing the opening time trial in Apeldoorn and moving into the pink jersey of race leader in his native Netherlands. Now that the race is back on Italian roads, the question is whether he can proceed to exceed expectations as he did at last year’s Vuelta a España.
Dumoulin surprised by leading that race into the penultimate stage to Cercedilla, before eventually cracking and sliding to sixth place overall in Madrid, but despite that flowering of his abilities over three weeks, he arrived at this Giro insisting that he is not harbouring realistic ambitions of a high overall finish.
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“I’m actually repeating myself every day,” Dumoulin smiled during his press conference in Benevento on Wednesday. “I prepared the Vuelta differently, with an eye to be good in the high mountains and I haven’t done that for the Giro, with an eye to the time trials this year [namely the Rio 2016 Olympics - ed.]”
Even so, Dumoulin holds a 16-second lead over Bob Jungels (Etixx-QuickStep) ahead of the Giro’s first mountaintop finish, while Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), a further ten seconds down, is the best of the overall favourites.
With Sunday’s Chianti time trial seemingly tailored to Dumoulin’s specifications, Nibali, Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) et al would dearly like to discommode the pink jersey before then. But while Dumoulin remains sceptical of his long-term chances, at least in public, he is upbeat about his prospects in the coming days.
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