12-time Giro stage winner names Merlier, Milan and Ewan as sprinters to watch
Jonathan Milan (centre) competes in a sprint finish wearing the purple points jersey at the 2023 Giro d'Italia(Image credit: Stuart Franklin/Getty Images)
All eyes are on Tadej Pogačar at the Giro d'Italia but Robbie McEwen can’t wait to see the sprint finishes during the next three weeks. The Australian won 12 stages at the Giro d’Italia during his own professional career and has become an excellent television sprint and race analyst since retiring in 2012.
The 2024 Giro d'Italia has attracted many of the best sprinters in the world, with only Jasper Philipsen, Mark Cavendish and Dylan Gronewegwen absent and fully focused on the Tour de France.
This year’s Corsa Rosa starts with two testing stages in Piemonte at the weekend but then there are six or seven sprint opportunities, including a final prestigious sprint finish in central Rome for those who survive the high mountains of the third week.
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For those who might become bored with Pogačar’s dominance or even consider the future of men’s racing bleak, then McEwen is convinced the Giro d’Italia sprinting will be the perfect antidote. The Australian will again be part of the Eurosport commentary team for the Giro and spoke to Cyclingnews and other media while travelling to Europe from his home on Australia’s Gold Coast.
“The Giro d’Italia sprints are going to be incredible, I'm really looking forward to the sprint battles we’ll see,” McEwen said with genuine enthusiasm for the sport and especially for sprinting.
“If you go back to when I was racing, there were a lot of sprints in the Giro but either [Mario] Cipollini or [Alessandro] Petacchi dominated thanks to their lead-out train. Now everything is just more complicated. I see a really evenly matched group of sprinters in this year’s race and they're always the most exciting sprints. It's going to be a surprise each day.”
McEwen’s first win at the Giro came in Strasbourg in 2002 when he beat Cipollini after the Giro started in the Netherlands. His last Giro win was in 2007 in Bosa, Sardinia, when he beat Paolo Bettini and Petacchi.
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McEwen raced BMX bikes as a boy and used his speed and small physique to take on the power sprinters like Cipollini, Petacchi, Erik Zabel, Tom Boonen and Thor Hushovd between 1996 and 2012. He would often dive through a gap that opened up along the barriers and then surge through to victory. McEwen was fearless but skilled on a bike. He won 116 races during his career, most of them in high-speed sprints.
He started the Giro d’Italia 10 times but never actually finished the Corsa Rosa due to the need to be strong and fresh for the subsequent Tour de France. It left him with a sense of unfinished business.
“I'd love to be amongst them this year, I loved the Giro sprints. For some riders, the more chaotic, the better and that was the same for me,” McEwen enthused.
“The Tour de France is such an enormous beast of a race that they have to finish on pretty big roads, where the Giro has the flexibility to finish in towns and there's these lefts and right turns.
“I think that makes really entertaining racing, and it sort of levels the playing field between those who brute strength in a straight line, but those who can actually race, those who order, those who can fight position, and that's where I really like that about the Giro sprints.”
Robbie McEwen (right) sprints against Daniele Bennati on stage 12 at 2008 Giro d'Italia, Mark Cavendish trailing (Image credit: Filippo Montefore AFP / Getty Images)
Star-studded sprinters start list
The 2024 Giro d’Italia sprinter start list includes Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek), Olav Kooij (Visma-Lease a Bike), Fabio Jakobsen (dsm-firmenich PostNL), Caleb Ewan (Jayco-AlUla), Fernando Gaviria (Movistar), Alberto Dainese (Tudor Pro Cycling), Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty), Danny Van Poppel (Bora-Hansgrohe), Phil Bauhaus (Bahrain Victorious) and Juan Sebastian Molano (UAE Team Emirates).
The likes of Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers), Kiwi revelation Laurence Pithie and his Groupama-FDJ teammate Lewis Askey, Ethan Vernon (Israel-Premier Tech) and Christophe Laporte (Visma-Lease a Bike) could emerge on the hillier, more selective stages that end in sprint.
“I think I counted 12 or 13 guys that can be in the mix to win any sprint stage. I'm not sure I've seen that many of any one race. I don't see anybody who is really going to dominate everybody else. There's going to be an element of luck, skill and speed involved each time,” McEwen suggested.
McEwen has already done some research for the three weeks to come, based on his own extensive knowledge of sprinting.
“A guy who always seems to make sense of the chaos as Tim Merlier even if he then fades deeper into a Grand Tour. He just finds the gaps, follows the right wheels and he's got really good instinct and confidence,” McEwen said in praise of the Soudal-QuickStep sprinter.
“I'm also really looking forward to how good Caleb Ewan is going to be at the Giro. He had a really complicated beginning of the season. He started well, and then he got very ill, and I think he tried to come back too quickly. He’s been training at altitude and has won at the Giro, so he can win again.
“There’s also Kaden Groves for the Aussies. It’s a pity that Sam Welsford wasn’t selected but it’s an opportunity for Danny Van Poppel to show himself.”
Tim Merlier, who won three stages at 2024 UAE Tour, last raced the Giro d'Italia in 2021 (Image credit: Getty Images)
McEwen saw how Jonathan Milan confirmed his sprinting ability in last year’s Giro d’Italia and expects even more from the Italian after his move to Lidl-Trek. Milan will have a powerful lead-out train that includes Jasper Stuyven, Ed Theuns and lead-out man and fellow track pursuiter Simone Consonni.
“The sky's the limit with Milan because he's just got such a massive engine. His engine is just ridiculously huge,” McEwen said.
“He was such a nice surprise to everybody last year. I think he actually has a lot of margin to improve. He's kind of rough around the edges in the sprints. If he can smooth everything out, he's going to get even faster.”
McEwen never finished the Giro d’Italia but often rode the Giro and Tour in the same year and knows about the mental and physical fatigue involved. He tipped Pogačar to win the Giro d'Italia but with a hint of caution.
“I don't remember anyone being such a big favourite to win. Something really really weird would have to happen for him not to win,” McEwen suggested. “If everything goes OK, if he has no incidents, accidents or illness, he's going to win. He's going to win by as much as he feels like winning by.
“I think the others also will be going into the race believing they're racing for a second. Yet the beautiful thing about the Giro is that every time we think we know what's going to happen, something else happens.”
McEwen has some simple advice for Pogačar as he targets the Giro-Tour double.
“Be conservative in the Giro because it's a long time until the end of the Tour,” McEwen warned.
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Stephen is one of the most experienced members of the Cyclingnews team, having reported on professional cycling since 1994. Before becoming Editor-at-large, he was Head of News at Cyclingnews. He has previously worked for Shift Active Media, Reuters and Cycling Weekly. He is a member of the Board of the Association Internationale des Journalistes du Cyclisme (AIJC).
