Anyway, back to the race. IMO, Dumoulin had the ride of the day on the Zoncolan. Hauling his relatively huge body up those insane slopes and limiting his losses to the likes of Yates and Froome was extremely impressive. He's going to utterly stomp both in the ITT coming up.

Today, Froome was dropped and Dumoulin lost another 40+ seconds. I think it's unlikely that Dumolin can make up 2+ minutes in the ITT and it's unlikely he's going to outclimb Yates. I predict another victory for an asthmatic! It's absolutely AMAZING how common that particular disease is in the pro peloton. Huh. What an inspiration to asthmatics everywhere. :eyeroll:

I want to say the same thing.

Here in Europe when I tell my friends that I am watching the Giro everyone instantly jokes about drugs and epo and doctores etc.

When the Fifa worldcup starts next week (in Russia) everyone will be watching and celebrating and noone even imagines that their heroes could do something wrong.

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10k - 30:48 / half - 1:06:40

I don't want to defend TUE abusers and in fact I want a neutral UCI doctor to decide who gets which medicine in which dose.

But, during the last few years, I developed Asthma myself and I guess it has to do with repeatedly pushing my body to the limit in various weathet consitions. So the huge number of asthmatics might stem from the nature that they go to the limit day after day over years and years.

What I don't understand though is why they get TUEs for the most aggressive medicaron. My inhaler wouldn't give anyone an advantage. And sometimes my asthma is worse than on normal days and I just have to accept it and adjust.

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10k - 30:48 / half - 1:06:40

Agreed about the double standard between sports for sure. It is why I can no longer get too outraged of the degree of doping or not in pro cycling. I view the UCI efforts as higher than other pro sports and their efforts (or not) as a means to keep a lid on the high octane doing. It is like what the securities exchange commission does for public companies so the value of stocks reflects companies conforming to laws. If not, where there is money you get a free for all as is the case with NFl

OK OK....we have a race between these two men. I just had to wait 20 days for it to materialize!!!!