The mammoth legs in the Alps next weekend may have drawn the eye when the Giro d’Italia route was presented in Milan last October, but beware the first stage after a rest day: hostilities resume on Tuesday with a short, sharp leg to Andalo that could well provoke further ructions in the general classification.
Just 132 kilometres in length and boasting two tough category 2 climbs, stage 16 of the Giro will provide a rather abrupt return to action after the rest day. Anybody struggling to get back up to speed quickly could be in for a far more arduous afternoon than the road book might have suggested – particularly as the miserable weather in South Tyrol meant that many riders were restricted to training on the rollers on Monday morning.
“Tomorrow is a hard stage, especially because it’s not long, so it could be a very intense stage from the start,” Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) warned during the rest day.
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There is almost certain to be a brisk start to proceedings. The opening 50 kilometres see the peloton descend gradually from the start in Bressanone, by way of Bolzano, before they hit the foot of the day’s first climb, the Passo della Mendola.
With an average gradient of 6.5% and a maximum of 10%, the Mendola is by no means a particularly difficult ascent, but it is some 14.8 kilometres in length and provides precious little respite all the way up.
Another lengthy descent follows the Passo della Mendola, with the route dropping via Cles – home of Maurizio Fondriest – to the base of the day’s second ascent, the shorter but steeper Fai della Paganella. The road climbs for 10 kilometres at an average gradient of 7.4% and features slopes of 15% just shy of the summit. “Those second-category climbs are really first-category, or even more than that,” Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) complained.
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