Monte Zoncolan will serve as the summit finish of stage 14 of the 2018 Giro d'Italia and will also feature on the Giro Donne route, La Gazzetta dello Sport has reported. The fearsome climb's first appearance in a major race came at the 1997 Giro Donne, and it has since featured five times at the men's Giro, most recently in 2014.
The full route of the 2018 Giro will be presented in Milan on Wednesday, but most of the course has already been leaked in the Italian press. A return to the Zoncolan has been strongly rumoured in recent weeks, and the news was confirmed on Sunday by La Gazzetta, which is part of the same RCS stable as the Giro organisation.
As has been the case since 2007, the Giro will take the most demanding way up the Zoncolan, approaching the climb from Ovaro. Just over 10 kilometres in length with an average gradient of 11.9%, the Zoncolan is a brute of a climb, and compact chainsets will be the order of the day as riders tackle the steepest section of 22%.
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The difficulty will be augmented on this occasion by the fact that the Zoncolan is just one of five climbs on the menu for May 19 of next year. According to La Gazzetta, stage 14 will set out from San Vito al Tagliamento, and the 181-kilometre leg will feature the climbs of Monte di Ragogna, Avaglio, the Passo Duron and the Sella Valcalda before the final haul up the Zoncolan.
The short but steep Passo Duron and 12% pitches of the Sella Valcalda, in particular, should provide something of a softening up process ahead of the Zoncolan, but, as ever, the mighty 'Kaiser' will be the highlight of the afternoon.
Gilberto Simoni was the first Giro winner atop the Zoncolan in 2003, a feat he repeated in 2007, the first year that the race went by way of Ovaro. Ivan Basso soloed to victory on the Zoncolan in 2010, while Igor Anton secured victory a year later.
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