Wouter Weylandt
The GC Contendors
After today’s assault on Etna, is there any question that Contador is going to win this race? With the massive climbs to come and his apparent fitness he could win this race by five or ten minutes. I just wish the cloud of the appeal wasn’t hanging over the proceedings. It’s a big weight on the whole event.
The rest of the guys really seemed happy to race for second. I do like Nibali staying with the second group and lingering around a podium place. I’d love to see him slot in behind Contador for second when the racing is done.
Johnny Hoogerland
It wasn’t worth much at the end of the day, but seeing Hoogerland’s aggression on Stage 7 was a great reminder of how fun he is to watch in a grand tour. Here’s hoping he repeats his Vuelta hijinks from a couple of years ago, where he animated the race for a couple of weeks with multiple, crazy, aggressive attacks.
Cipollini Bikes
The Farnese Vini team is riding Cipollini bikes and RAI has been pretty good at lingering on them when any Fanrese Vini riders are in the break or otherwise animating the race. I’m officially a fan. They haven’t replaced Pinarello as my favorite Italian bike brand, but they are pretty sweet looking.
Just in case you were keeping track :).
Hooray for Exciting, Unpredictable Racing
While an enormous part of the fact that I think the Giro is the best bike race in the world* is that it’s in Italy, another part is that the racing itself is usually far superior to that at the Tour. The Tour is usually so predictable and boring, with stages playing out according to plan more often than not. The Giro, especially this year’s event, is nothing like that. Crazy stuff happens at the Giro and with an Italian backdrop, there’s really no other stage race that can compare.
*thinking about it today, if I were a professional cyclist I’d rather win a single stage of the Giro than the overall at the Tour of California. Not that anyone asked me what I thought about the two events, of course.
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