Giro d'Italia: Filippo Ganna wins stage 14 time trial in Valdobbiadene

Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers) destroyed the competition to take his third victory at the Giro d’Italia, winning the stage 14 time trial in a blistering time of 42:40. The world champion was 26 seconds quicker than his teammate Rohan Dennis in second place.

Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates) was by far the best performer of the GC contenders, finishing in third at 43 seconds behind Dennis and rocketing himself into fourth place overall. Having started the day in 11th place, McNulty is now just 12 seconds off a podium position after Pello Bilbao gave away more than a minute to the top GC riders.

Aside from McNulty’s ride, there was no huge shake-up in the overall standings. Maglia rosa João Almeida (Deceuninck-QuickStep) gained time on all his nearest rivals. Wilco Kelderman (Sunweb) lost just 16 seconds to remain within one minute of the Portuguese rider. Meanwhile, Vincenzo Nibali (Trek-Segafredo) is now 2:30 away from the pink jersey after giving away 1:23 on Almeida.

The day belonged to Ganna, though, who looked on course for victory right from the start. The 24-year-old has appeared adept on nearly all terrains at this Giro d’Italia but he was in his domain on stage 14. He and Dennis were just a second apart at the first time check on the top of the Muro di Ca’ del Poggio. As the road flattened out the young Italian applied the power and stretched his lead over his more experienced teammate, eventually crossing the line with a 26-second advantage.

It is Ganna’s third win in the opening two weeks and the fourth for Ineos Grenadiers, after Jhonatan Narváez won on stage 12, with another time trial to come on the final day in Milan.

“Every victory is important for me and in this Giro we have a really strong team, we win everywhere and we are really happy,” Ganna said after the stage. “In the start I felt OK, we had one kilometre, five minutes climb that was not very easy, but the finish leg was really, really well and I felt better and better.”

How it unfolded

Unlike the opening time trial test, stage 14 from Conegliano to Valdobbiadene got underway in calm and dry conditions in Italy’s prosecco region. As often is the case in Grand Tour chronos, the day would feature two battles – one for the stage win and the other between the general classification contenders.

The rolling 34.1km stage had two major stings in it with the brutal fourth category Muro di Ca’ del Poggio coming just over six kilometres into the stage and another uphill challenge within the final 10km.The former would be the sternest test with gradients of up to 19 per cent on its 1.1km distance.

The list of early starters was packed with strong time triallists and it was Mathias Brandle (Israel Start-Up Nation) that set the early benchmark with a time of 45:23, but his time on the hotseat was already numbers as Victor Campanaerts (NTT Pro Cycling) and set the fastest times at the checkpoints out on course.

The Belgian Hour Record holder took almost 40 seconds out of Brandle, setting the new fastest time of 44:46. Like Brandle before him, the next stage contender was already out on course and claiming the top spot at each of the time checks. Dennis (Ineos Grenadiers) had a difficult time of it in the opening time trial but he looked on-song as he powered through the course. Behind him, his teammate, and time trial world champion, Filippo Ganna was already picking off the riders ahead of him with ruthless efficiency.  

Dennis crossed the line with a new best time of 43:06 but he was only keeping the hot seat warm for his Italian teammate. Ganna didn’t miss a pedal stroke at any point, sailing up the climbs as if they were not there. The world champion blew away the rest of his rivals as he crossed the line in a time of 42:40. With the general classification contenders still to come, Ganna could sit back and relax in relative comfort that his time would not be bested.

As the stage reached its denouement, McNulty set out with a mission, losing just 15 seconds to Ganna by the second check point. The American held his nerve throughout to post a time of 43:49, to take third on the stage and propel himself up the standings and within touching distance of a podium place.

MucNulty was the only member of the top 10 to gain time on Almeida, who looked assured in his maglia rosa skinsuit. The Deceuninck-QuickStep rider was unable to gain the same margins on some of his rivals in Valdobbiadene as he had done on the opening day of racing but he still increased his advantage at the top of the overall classification. After a rocky start to the Giro d’Italia, Kelderman put in a strong performance to keep himself well in contention for the overall classification ahead of a difficult mountain test.

Jai Hindley (Sunweb) was the biggest loser from the top 10, losing over two minutes to Almeida and dropping to 10th overall. Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) had also a bad day on the time trial bike, slipping down to 12th in the general classification.