Yates soars, Froome flops - Giro d'Italia rest day podcast

It’s the second rest day of the 2018 Giro d’Italia and the Cyclingnews team are back to dissect the latest developments in Italy.

Since our last episode after last week’s Mount Etna stage, the general classification took further shape at the weekend with summit finishes on Montevergine di Mercogliano and Gran Sasso d’Italia.

Chris Froome crashed on the former and lost a minute on the latter, and we’ll hear from the Team Sky rider as he sat down with the press near the Adriatic coast on Monday’s rest day. Daniel Benson is joined by Patrick Fletcher and Procycling magazine Editor Ed Pickering to discuss whether the four-time Tour de France champion can now realistically win this Giro, and why Sky have found the Giro such a tough nut to crack.

We’ll also hear from Simon Yates, who added a further stamp of authority on proceedings with stage victory on Gran Sasso. He looks comfortably the strongest rider in the race, we conclude, and has one of the strongest teams.

As well as focusing on the two Brits, we ponder whether 2017 champion Tom Dumoulin, third overall, should be satisfied or concerned, whether Montevergine winner Richard Carapaz is the real deal, and why Astana burned their matches on Gran Sasso.

Thoughts are spared, too, for the relative fortunes of Rohan Dennis, Domenico Pozzovivo, and Fabio Aru.

The Cyclingnews podcast is brought to you in association with Prendas Ciclismo, Pinarello and Floyds of Leadville.  Click here to subscribe.