Giro d'Italia

[2ndwheel]

Hilly

You eye's must look like dinner plates with all the sleep you not getting.

[El Imbatido]

General classification after stage 16 # Rider Name (Country) Team Result 1 David Arroyo Duran (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 68:32:26   2 Richie Porte (Aus) Team Saxo Bank 0:02:27   3 Ivan Basso (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo 0:02:36   4 Carlos Sastre Candil (Spa) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:09   5 Cadel Evans (Aus) BMC Racing Team 0:04:36   6 Alexandre Vinokourov (Kaz) Astana 0:04:53   7 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo 0:05:12   8 Michele Scarponi (Ita) Androni Giocattoli 0:05:25

Cyclingnews actually amended their overall standings. Evans is fourth at 3.09 and Sastre is fifth at 4.36

[hilljockey]

From another forum.

A quote from a bloke leading a touring group on last nights stage:

QUOTE
Italian Support Report: Every Italian rider on course today, without live TV coverage (ie a prominent camera on a motorbike nearby) was pushed by fans. All our group, split up all over the hill witnessed this. The fans still cheered all the other riders, more than politely, but did not push. I did not see the TV coverage for Garzelli (or any other rider), but felt his result today was unusual.

Saw it myself on the interweb, Basso I think getting a huge push for quite a while...

[hilljockey]

This site:

http://videochat.gazzetta.it/index_giro.shtml

Not only has streaming video, but, also has gradient and speed for lead group, updated every few seconds.

Cool.

Edit to add:  Also live position on course profile, and, live splits between groups.

[hilljockey]

You eye's must look like dinner plates with all the sleep you not getting

The eyes are tired today.  These big mountain stages take a long time and finish late.  Big night of action again.

It looked hard, the racing was good, and, it turns out there were plenty fined for hanging on to cars including an expulsion from the tour!

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/team-skys-chris-froome-expelled-from-giro

Basso is a girly descender, Arroyo is not.

Still waiting the invite from Bill Cox to watch it on television instead of a 4 inch square window on the PC...

[hilljockey]

What the Gavia (part of tonight's stage) used to look like before they built tunnels in places.

[drv31t]

Hillhockey, I would be lost if I didn't watch it on the 4" screen. I wouldn't know where to look.......

[hilljockey]

All done.

Interesting articles:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/evans-reveals-he-overcame-illness-to-finish-the-giro

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/australians-win-all-secondary-jerseys-of-the-giro-ditalia

And a summary you may or may not agree with:

It was a very Italian Giro d'Italia, but with a very modern feel. The Tour de France is still the biggest Grand Tour in cycling but the Giro d'Italia is perhaps the most exciting and the most spectacular.

[hilljockey]

Basso's Blood Values Publicised
Recent Giro winner Ivan Basso has lived up to his transperancy promise by publishing his blood values from the biological passport program in the Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport this weekend. The results show that his hematocrit level in Amsterdam before the start of the race was at 43% hematocrit & 13.9g/dl haemoglobin, the second control was on the second rest day (40.9, 13.3) and the final control was in Verona on the morning of the last stage (38.7, 12.9).

So overall a 4.3% drop in hematocrit during the 3 week race - totally normal according to the experts and evidence of a 'good possibility' of a clean result. According to the UCI the blood levels have dropped significantly throughout the peloton since 2008 - after the introduction of their biological passport system and a 3-6% drop is exactly what they expect to see after a Grand Tour.