For a stage that was advertised as a good day for the breakaway but little would happen in the general classification battle, stage 15 at the 2019 Giro d'Italia indeed delivered the breakaway to the finish, but a final climb near the end of the day and the corresponding descent wreaked temporary havoc on the three-week hostilities to wear the final maglia rosa in Verona on June 2.
Astana's Dario Cataldo rode a two-rider breakaway to the stage win in Como ahead of Mattia Cattaneo (Androni Giocattoli-Sidermec), while on the roads behind the opportunistic pair, the general classification race blew apart as attacks flew on the penultimate climb, putting pre-race favourtte Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) under pressure and forcing several costly mishaps. As Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain-Merida) and race leader Richard Carapaz (Movistar) pressed the pace, Roglic first suffered a mechanical and then overcooked a corner on the descent and briefly collided with a guardrail.
At the end of the day, the Slovenian lost 40 seconds to his GC rivals, and Simon Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) continued his comeback climb up the GC rankings with third place on the stage.