Well its kind of exciting seeing the Giro going South to North in October. Normally the big climbs in the Dolomites and Alps are in the last week of May to allow for things to warm up so riders are not riding through snow (well minus Hampsten's win on Gavia in 1989)



Nice line up of GC guys most of whom were at Tirreno Adriatico and the UCI worlds in Imola:

• Simon Yates (UAE Tour winner, Tirenno Adriatico winner)
• Geriant Thomas (they have a solid team there too)
• Vincenzo Nibali
• Kruiswijk (maybe Jumbo lucked out by having his "saved for Giro"....he nearly won a few years ago minus the snowbank crash on the stage to Sestrieres)
• Fuglsang (with Lopez as "helper" off the TdF)

On the sprinter side, Arnaud deMarre skiped the TdF. Sagan and Viviani are coming off the TdF. Michael Mathews injured at Milano San Remo missed the TdF and he was pretty solid at the UCI Worlds.

ITT on Stage 1 in Palermo

Two Queen Stages, stage 18 that takes in Stelvio North Side and then a downhill and gravel climb to the finish. Stage 20 goes over to Sestriere. Hopefully there is no snow. Sestriere already has snow in the forecast all of this weekend while the Giro is opening in Palermo Siciliy. We get treated with a climb up Mt. Etna in week 1 too! A solid 1100m vertical gain so we should immediately get some GC separation in week 1