The Giro d’Italia has been whipped up for months into a titanic duel between Remco Evenepoel and Primoz Roglic. That duel promises fireworks, but there are more eye-catchers at the start. Through orange glasses we highlight ten riders who are also aiming for a leading role.
Philip Ganna
- Country: Italy
- Age: 26 years
- Team: INEOS Grenadiers
- Specialism: time trial
From an Italian perspective, Ganna must be the star of this Giro. The conditions are right, because the ball will be opened this afternoon with a 20-kilometer time trial. If the two-time world champion strikes, he will probably be allowed to parade through his home country in pink for a week.
Evenepoel and Roglic will not regret that. The tall Ganna sits on a bicycle like a Roman statue, has the appearance of a movie star and can therefore attract all the attention during the first few days. This enables the two tenors to work towards their duel in relative lee.
Mads Pedersen
- Country: Denmark
- Age: 27 years
- Team: Trek-Segafredo
- Specialties: sprinting
Pedersen seems to have cracked the code. After his surprising world title in 2019, the Dane faded into the background a bit, but last season he was unstoppable at times. Pedersen won a stage in the Tour and then went on a Sagan-esque rampage in the Vuelta, taking three stage wins and taking home the points jersey.
This Giro he is aiming for a similar scenario. It won’t be the shape. Pedersen put an unparalleled spring on the asphalt with top results in almost all Flemish classics. Kaden Groves seems to be his biggest opponent in the battle for the points jersey, although Fernando Gaviria and Magnus Cort will also dream of the color purple.
Jay Vine
- Country: Australia
- Age: 27 years
- Team: UAE Team Emirates
- Specialties: Climbing
Vine decorated a professional contract in corona time by excelling in the online fitness game Zwift. The Australian is an exponent of the generation of mathematicians that sails almost entirely on the power meter. These riders stare stoically at the screen on the handlebars and know exactly how fast they have to ride to make it to the finish.
In this way, Vine won two mountain stages in the last Vuelta. That first victory in particular stood out, because he climbed faster that day than the unchained Evenepoel. In January, Vine won the Tour Down Under, after which a knee injury sidelined him for a long time. This Giro he forms a dangerous tandem with his Portuguese leader João Almeida.
Tao Geoghegan Hart
- Country: Great Britain
- Age: 28 years
- Team: INEOS Grenadiers
- Specialism: rankings
With Evenepoel and Roglic there seem to be only two candidates for the pink jersey. If a third contender has to be designated, you might end up with Geoghegan Hart. The Briton has already won the Giro once in 2020. In addition, he is one of the few climbers with a great final shot. That could be a weapon in the coming weeks.
INEOS, as usual, bets on several horses. Geoghegan Hart shares this Giro with his compatriot Geraint Thomas. The 2018 Tour winner has an edge in terms of experience and toughness, but recent results favor Geoghegan Hart. He was in a class of his own in the Tour of the Alps recently.
Favorieten voor de Giro d’Italia
- ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Remco Evenepoel, Primoz Roglic
- ⭐⭐⭐⭐
- ⭐⭐⭐ Tao Geoghegan Hart, João Almeida
- ⭐⭐ Geraint Thomas, Santiago Buitrago, Jay Vine
- ⭐ Aleksandr Vlasov, Damiano Caruso, Hugh Carthy
Bauke Mollema
- Country the Netherlands
- Age: 36 years
- Team: Trek-Segafredo
- Specialism: hijacking rides
Since Koen Bouwman is employed by Roglic, Mollema will have to uphold the Dutch honor when it comes to daytime successes. The cunning Groninger has already won stages in the Tour and Vuelta, and will try to fill his bingo card. A Giro stage victory is probably the only real goal that Mollema still has. He has already proven everything in his rich career.
The fifteenth stage with finish in Bergamo will be circled in red in his agenda. That course is very similar to the Tour of Lombardy, the cycling monument that Mollema wrote to his name in 2019. Because teammate Giulio Ciccone has withdrawn due to corona, Trek-Segafredo will go to the Giro without a real classification rider. So free game for Mollema.
Ben Healy
- Country: Ireland
- Age: 22 years
- Ploeg: EF Education-EasyPost
- Specialties: Climbing
Every cycling spring brings a great discovery and this year it’s Healy. Attention was initially drawn to his lush curls – the young Irishman seems to have walked out of a boy band – but in the end it was mainly about his powerful legs. In the Walloon classics he turned out to belong to the world top.
Healy is a good time trialist, but the question is whether he will focus on the classification this Giro. Given his form, he can easily win one or two mountain stages, which at this stage of his career is perhaps more sensible than fighting for a place of honor in Rome for three weeks. In addition, his team with Hugh Carthy and Rigoberto Urán already has two experienced classification riders in house.
Dominic Pozzo alive
- Country: Italy
- Age: 40 years
- Team: Israel-Premier Tech
- Specialties: Climbing
Pozzovivo is the oldest participant and is joint record holder with no fewer than eighteen Giro starts. The little Italian is a sight, if only because of the unnatural position of his left elbow after an operation a few years ago. ‘Dr. Moreover, Pozzo’ does not want to know about wear and tear and is aiming for the eighth top ten result of his career.
Not everything in his life revolves around the bike. Pozzovivo graduated as an economist (hence the nickname), can play the piano and, as an amateur meteorologist, likes to predict the weather. With the latter hobby he often assists his team during the briefing. This Giro can Pozzovivo again. The queen stage (stage 19) seems to take place in winter conditions: there is a thick layer of snow in the Dolomites.
Thymen Arensman
- Country the Netherlands
- Age: 23 years
- Team: INEOS Grenadiers
- Specialism: rankings
Arensman’s first season with the INEOS star ensemble is a bit disappointing for the time being. The Dutchman is undeniably a great talent and underlined this with his solo ride in the queen stage of the last Vuelta, but this year it does not want to come out yet. Still, his team remains confident.
Arensman will probably operate as a shadow leader behind the British duo Geoghegan Hart and Thomas. On paper, the Dutchman should be able to finish in the general classification. He is a very good time trialist, and that is precisely where the center of gravity of this Giro lies. There are no less than three races against the clock on the menu.
Nederlandse deelnemers
- Oscar Riesebeek (Alpecin-Deceuninck)
- Ramon Sinkeldam (Alpecin-Deceuninck)
- Lars van den Berg (Groupama – FDJ)
- Thymen Arensman (INEOS Grenadiers)
- Koen Bouwman (Jumbo-Visma)
- Sam Oomen (Jumbo-Visma)
- David Dekker (Arkéa Samsic)
- Martijn Tusveld (Team DSM)
- Daan Hoole (Trek-Segafredo)
- Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo)
Kaden Groves
- Country: Australia
- Age: 24 years
- Team: Alpecin-Deceuninck
- Specialties: sprinting
On March 25, something special happened. Groves won the sixth stage of the Tour of Catalonia in a rarely seen way. The Australian punctured 6 kilometers from the finish, quickly climbed onto a teammate’s bike, squeezed into the front of the peloton and then sprinted everyone out of the wheel.
That day he definitively established his name, insofar as that had not already happened due to his Vuelta stage victory last year. In the absence of Mathieu van der Poel, Groves will receive a tailor-made team in the Giro. His sprint train also has a world-class driver in Ramon Sinkeldam.
Santiago Buitrago
- Land: Colombia
- Age: 23 years
- Ploeg: Bahrain Victorious
- Specialism: rankings
If you participate in a cycling game and want to include a nice outsider for the final podium in your team, it is advisable to think of Buitrago. The Colombian won a mountain stage last year by beating the Dutch talent Gijs Leemreize in a nice duel and then finished eleventh in the final classification. This year he is aiming higher.
His team Bahrain will enter with a three-man monster, because Damiano Caruso and Jack Haig will also have a good ranking in mind. Buitrago is a lot younger than these two and has now shown to have the most talent. He recently finished third in Liège-Bastogne-Liège.
2023-05-06 03:06:32
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