Giro d'Italia: Caleb Ewan wins crash-marred stage 5

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Caleb Ewan’s (Lotto Soudal) dreams of winning stages in all three Grand Tours this year kicked into life on stage 5 of the Giro d’Italia with the Australian winning ahead of Giacomo Nizzolo (Team Qhubeka Assos) and Elia Viviani (Cofidis) after a tense and chaotic sprint.

The day was overshadowed by a string of crashes in the final 15 kilometres with Pavel Sivakov (Ineos Grenadiers) and Mikel Landa (Bahrain Victorious) both hitting the deck in separate incidents. Landa was treated at the side of the road by medical staff and then taken to hospital, ruling him out of the race altogether.

Ewan’s sprint, however, saw the Lotto Soudal rider finally find his feet after a difficult opening few days in the Giro d’Italia in which he suffered in the conditions and looked somewhat short of his best form.

On stage 5, he was back to his imperious best, using his lead-out to perfection and coming from way back to deny Nizzolo his maiden Giro d’Italia stage. Even a late tangle with Tim Merlier (Alpecin-Fenix) couldn’t rob Ewan of his win, with the Lotto leader remaining upright before he used his speed and his ability to follow the right wheel at the right time before edging ahead of Nizzolo inside the final 50 metres.

It was Peter Sagan’s Bora-Hansgrohe team that controlled the peloton in the final 1,500 metres with several tight corners stringing out the peloton. Ewan had to back off at one point after he found himself too close to the front but he followed Viviani when the Italian launched his sprint with 125m to go, before moving into the centre of the road and over the top of both the Cofidis rider and Nizzolo. Sagan and Fernando Gaviria completed the top five.

"It was a relief. My goal is to win in all three and the first sprint stage didn't go good at all, so there was a lot of pressure on me and the team to do a good job. I think they outperformed themselves. Without them I wouldn't have been so fresh at the finish and I got good lines through all the corners in the last 20 kilometres. I think I showed that I had the best legs in the final," Ewan said.

"I don't know what happened [with Merlier]. I think there were some guys coming back through the bunch and there were a few twitchy moments. It didn't stop me too much and I was still able to get out, so I was lucky, I think. The goal to start with was one win. I've done that and I'm pretty hungry to win as much as I can. This is good confidence for the team and myself going forward and we'll give the next few sprint stages a good shot as well."

In the overall standings, Alessandro De Marchi (Israel Start-up Nation) maintained his lead and the maglia rosa, but the loss of Mikel Landa from the race comes as a huge blow for both the Spaniard and his Bahrain Victorious team. 

Landa had gone on the attack on stage 4 and looked like a genuine contender for the podium after a brisk and consistent start to the race, but with 4.3km to go the Bahrain Victorious rider crashed with stage 4 winner Joe Dombrowski (UAE Team Emirates) when a rider hit a traffic island and the marshal charged with warning riders of the road furniture. 

When Dombrowski was able to remount and limp home to fight another day, Landa was left lying on the roadside, his team solemnly leaving him behind and crossing the line together several minutes after Ewan had blazed to glory.

For Sivakov, the prognosis was somewhat better, although he too would go for scans after he crashed inside the final 15km. The Russian was given the co-leadership of Ineos Grenadiers alongside Egan Bernal but after losing time on stage 4 Sivakov limped home several minutes down with his GC ambitions over for another year.

How it unfolded

After the first GC mountain stage on stage 4 and the dismal conditions faced by the peloton the riders were treated to a complete contrast on Wednesday with brighter skies and a pan-flat 177km between Modena and Cattolica. With a day designed entirely with the sprinters in mind it was little surprise to see a lack of enthusiasm to form an early break. In fact, only two riders put their hands up with Filippo Tagliani (Androni Giocattoli-Sidermec) and Umberto Marengo (Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) moving clear almost immediately.

The pair built up a healthy near five-minute lead on the peloton but at the intermediate sprint the bunch accelerated, and although the duo took first and second at that point, they were reeled in soon after. That left the peloton looking around for ideas and direction, as with 100km to go there was no team willing to control proceedings, and little interest from riders willing to attack. In the end, Simon Pellaud (Androni Giocattoli-Sidermec) and Davide Gabburo (Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) dutifully obliged and provided desperate television commentators with something to talk about with the pair stretching out a minute’s advantage with 68km to go.

Alexis Gougeard attacked with 24km to go to make it three riders up front but by then the peloton were closing in on the finish and with the sprinters’ teams on the front there was little chance of any break succeeding.

Sivakov crashed with 15.8km to go, and for a moment, it looked as though his race was over, before Tejay van Garderen got in on the act by coming down on a tight left-hander. There was another crash with 8km remaining but with 4.3km to go the most serious of incidents took out Landa and left the race without one of its potential winners. A day that promised nothing but a routine sprint ended up delivering one of the key GC moments of the race so far. Sadly, it was also one of the most unfortunate.