Love that dude!

Was cool seeing Reuben "the Hotel" Plaza smiling and high fiving the fans along the way. Need more of that. The Hotel has been around....

Place your bets for tomorrow. Who launches, who lurches? Who crushes, who is the grape? I noticed Baby Pistolero not looking very bouncy today. Movistar will be ready to kill.

Yates is all over the mountain. Who knows?

I think Roglic may crack, but I'm pulling for him to stick. Nibs cares not about just being on a podium, and will do or die. His descending will be sick.

Joe is going to really try to get in the break. Hope he makes it in. Or Carthy. Or both. I hope they overtake Zakarin in GC.

What's the make up of the break? Pick 5.

Movistar looks too strong if the break doesn't have a GC threat in it (Lopez, Yates, Mollema, etc.). If the highest GC contender in the break is 12+ minutes back, Movistar will be content to ride moderate tempo up the first two climbs and keep their team together. I don't think Nibs (and certainly not Roglic) are strong enough right now to take on the entire Movistar team with a suicide move from 120 km out. So if the break isn't a threat, the break wins the day, and we see GC action in the final 20k. Where I think Roglic gets dropped, Nibs tries, but doesn't have enough. Landa moves into 3rd.

However, if the lower GC guys (Yates, Mollema, Majka, etc.) say fuck this...we're going for the last podium spot and try to get into the early break...that opens up potential. Movistar would then have to ride a much harder tempo to manage the gap and burn up teammates. If Carapaz shows some weakness in the final 20 km with only Landa as a teammate left...what does Landa do? Wishful thinking though...but one can hope.

You're talking about the break du jour, and not a late GC split?

I'd love to say Dombrowski, but he's in the weird gray area where he's clearly way out of contention, but just close enough that it's going to piss people off if he tries to get in the break.

So:

Gasparato
Bakelants.
Sosa
Warbasse
De Gendt

Masnada
Carboni
Cimolai
De Gendt
Conci, Ciccone, Brambilla - ok i'll go with Brambilla

du jour....agreed, will be tough for any top/remote GC guys to get in...I'd love to see Warbasse and TDG in it with Larry getting his, what a hard working pro......

Nibali better start performing tomorrow as all this talk about all in for 1st is looking a bit like all talk. Roglic and Nibali are somewhat in the same boat, they both need to attack tomorrow. Even if they can simply force Carapaz to do extra work that can make him tired for the final TT. I am not sure about Carapaz's ability to put in a good TT at the end of three weeks of racing. Roglic has proven he can TT well when fatigued. Carapaz lost 45 seconds on the opening TT, he could in theory loose 90 seconds or more on a bad day. I doubt he gives up 140 seconds in 17k, that is almost 10 seconds a K slower than Roglic.

Tomorrow has the potential to be epic if Roglic and Nibali actually go all in and try to win the Giro, but often they are so tired it ends up being fairly boring. I think Roglic looks fine lately, everybody is so fatigued the pure climbers are muted. I think Carapaz or Nibali might blow tomorrow, i suspect Roglic will be fine. Then again that is just watching body language from today. If Roglic or Nibali can find an extra 30 seconds this could be a very interesting TT.

Zakarin got in the break so it's not going too far.

wow....118k to go and Lopez launches......giddyup

Masnada's flapping gilet/jersey drives me nuts

damn Movistar sure has the numbers

Zakarin hit the deck already so things have returned to normal.

hah - good shot of the torn shorts, he sure bounced up quickly cause we never saw the spill;
glad it didn't affect anyone else

I sure got the break wrong.

Not good sponsor support for Mollema to scream "Fucking SRAM!"

seems too late in stage for much change in GC now unless someone really cracks

thought that was an awesome capture !

Joe and Hugh are in a very good spot if they have any legs left

Extra points for Lopez beating down the spectator!

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"They know f_ck-all over at Slowtwitch"
- Lionel Sanders

Oh well, just like predicted. Carapaz or baby pistolero just kicked everyone’s butt. So proud of this boy ;)

Dude got his nickname "Superman" for fighting off four guys who tried to steal his bike.

LOL, somehow i missed this, what happened?

He was fighting his RD with the chain skipping around and the moto mic picked up his frustrated language with great clarity. The announcers were complementing his command of English profanity.

And Stetina with the dead battery today in DK! You know Trek was super pissed he did not win DK, well they can now blame Sram!

C'mon Chad!

That hot seat ought to be effing steaming by now...

He beat Roglic!! Huge result if he wins.

without googling/searching/using wikipedia, name the last two American stage winners at il Giro, and the year when they won the respective stages. Baby Giro and Giro Feminine don't count

1 point to the first response correctly identifying each rider (2 points max) toward next year's Spring Classic pick'em