Giro d'Italia stage 16 LIVE: Third week begins with another big summit finish in the Alps
Back to the mountains and into Switzerland for the 11.7km climb to Carì
The pace slows down in the peloton for a few moments, but now a UAE rider has attacked.
90KM TO GO
The break is holding the chasing peloton, and have increased their lead a little to 25 seconds.
Both Lidl and UAE actually have men in the break, in Teutenberg and Morgado respectively, but can't be hopeful of their chances winning the stage on the summit finish, as they continue to chase.
In the break, Beloki stands out as the best climber, as well as being easily the highest ranked rider on GC, in 18th at 11:33.
At the moment the peloton is winning the pursuit they've brought the gap down to 20 seconds.
This is a proper pursuit between the breakaway, who are desperate to stay out, and the peloton, which is being pulled along by both UAE and Lidl.
The breakaway up the road.
100KM TO GO
Lidl are contributing with UAE now, but it's still looking like a big ask to bring them back - they're 38 seconds behind.
It’s still not over - UAE are next to lead the peloton with Bjerg.
Lidl might have given up the ghost! They’ve sat up and no other team is taking it on in the peloton.
Right now the break has 30 seconds, with Lidl still leading at the front of the peloton.
That might be a big group, but it's not one made up of riders with the kind of pure climbing legs that will be necessary to win on finish like today's.
The 11 riders up the road are: Beloki, Ulissi, Jacobs, Oliveira, Morgado, Van den Broeck, Juul-Jensen, Gualdi, Teutenberg, Crescioli and Tarozzi.
Not yet - Lidl don't seem happy with it and have put Milan at the front to pace the peloton.
11 riders have come together at the front and the rest of the peloton has regrouped. Could this be the break of the day?
6 more riders have joined them, including Beloki and Ulissi, while there are multiple groups strewn across the road behind.
Jacobs has gone again, this time with Tarozzi and Nelson Oliveira.
They've all been brought back.
Van der Lee has two riders with him: Naberman and Jacobs.
The first attacker is Van der Lee. He's wearing the blue jersey, but is only wearing that jersey in reserve from Jonas Vingegaard who leads the mountains classification. He'll be after the points on offer today to take that jersey outright.
It was announced this morning that Pascal Ackermann has withdrawn from the race, but the other 157 riders who finished in Milan have taken to the start today.
The mountain top finish ensures this is one for the climbers, but the opening 25km are flat, so it will be interesting to see which riders manage to get into the breakaway at the start. There are still no less than 17 teams without a stage win at the race yet, and so desperation to do so will be reaching fever pitch in the peloton, and therefore another big fight to get into the break is on the cards.
The riders at the start, for what is another hot and sunny day at the Giro.
How will Visma-Lease a Bike ride today? While they were intent on bringing the breakaway back last Saturday to set Vingegaard up for the stage win, they’re often happy to cede the stage win to the breakaway on late mountain stages like this, so may chose to take it easy at the font provided no GC threat manages to slip into the break.
The flag has just been waved for the unofficial start, greeted by the usual fanfare of Europop and a fast talking Italian announcer on a mic.
While Vingegaard has a big lead of 2:26 at the top of the GC, the riders immediately behind him are far more closely clustered together. Between Afonso Eulálio in second and Michael Storer in seventh, the time gap is only 2:20, and therefore there are plenty of opportunities for changes in the GC, starting today.
For Jonas Vingegaard, having seized the Maglia Rosa with a crushing win on Saturday, the final week is all about seeing the victory home. He’ll have one eye on the Tour de France, which he intends to ride as fresh as possible, but will still have a difficult final week to negotiate to seal victory here.
To get to the summit finish today, the riders will cross the border into Switzerland to take on a fearsome climb to Carì. Like the stage to Pila last Saturday, and to the Blockhaus during the first week, this one is a proper mountain, and only the best climbers will be able to cope with its 8% gradient stretched out over 11.6km.
We hope the riders are all fresh and raring to go after their rest yesterday, as a typically tough final weeks get underway with a brute of a mountain top finish.
Hello and welcome to stage 16 of the Giro d'Italia!
