Giro d'Italia stage 4 - Live coverage

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of stage 4 of the Giro d'Italia, where the riders will take on the first summit finish of the race at Mount Etna.

Today's stage kicks off at 12:25 local time, so half an hour away. 

The riders hit Italian soil for the first time today after three stages in Hungary for the Grande Partenza.

Here's a look back at stage 3, which ended the Giro's Hungarian trip on Sunday.

Giro d'Italia: Mark Cavendish wins stage 3

Meanwhile, here's our preview of today's test from Barry Ryan, who is on the ground covering the entire Giro once again.

Etna to shed new light on Giro d'Italia picture – Preview

Mathieu van der Poel holds the race leader's pink jersey after the first three stages. Barring a miracle on Etna he should let go of that today, though.

"Normally it won't be possible to keep the jersey on the Etna. I'll see how it goes and how I feel, but I don’t know how far I can go."

Guarnieri delivers 'silent but not silent' protest of Hungary's transphobic laws

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The riders are currently signing in at the team presentation. BikeExchange-Jayco and top GC man so far Simon Yates say hello to Italy. 

The riders have now rolled out in Avola to start the 4.8km neutral zone.

We all know that Van der Poel is in pink but here's a look at the other jersey holders.

Rick Zabel is in the blue KOM jersey, Biniam Girmay wears the ciclamino points jersey, while Matteo Sobrero is in the white of best young rider.

172km to go

The flag drops and the attacks fly straight away.

Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal) leads the attacking from the off.

He has four men with him, including teammate Matt Holmes. More men are chasing. 

Natnael Tesfatsion (Drone Hopper-Androni Giocattoli), Nico Denz (Team DSM), Jonathan Caicedo (EF Education-EasyPost) are up there too.

Caicedo won the early Etna stage two years ago, of course.

168km to go

The five men out front have around 10-15 seconds on the peloton.

Miguel Angel López is back at his Astana team car. We're unsure what the problem is at the moment.

Vincenzo Albanese (Eolo-Kometa) is up with the five attackers now, but the peloton is closing in.

De Gendt continues to drive it on.

A crash in the peloton as the riders wind their way through the narrow streets of a town.

Giovanni Aleotti (Bora-Hansgrohe) was one of the riders to hit the ground.

164km to go

Holmes keeps pushing on in the lead. No real gaps up front.

Simon Yates was also caught in that crash. It wasn't a particularly bad one, though.

Caleb Ewan is out the back of the peloton, meanwhile. He's looking around for him team car and might have a mechanical.

Ewan stops and gets a bike change.

Lotto keep trying to get in the break. Holmes goes again.

Mauri Vansevenant (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl) follows him.

162km to go

Rein Taaramäe (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert) also up front, as is Lennard Kämna (Bora-Hansgrohe).

Stage 3 winner Mark Cavendish (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl) is out the back of the peloton and Michael Mørkøv drops back to help. It's been pretty much all uphill so far, though a gradual drag rather than a big climb.

Another crash in the peloton. Roger Kluge (Lotto Soudal) is down, as is a race moto. Unsure what happened there. All involved look OK though.

Ah, a cluster of motos were riding alongside the rear peloton and one of them got caught on the wall lining the road, causing the knock-on effect.

Kluge sits on the low wall as he gets checked by the race doctor.

159km to go

Taaramäe, Kämna, and Vansevenant continue to drive the attacking group. It looks like there's around six others up there.

Trek, Astana, Jumbo, Lotto also represented.

Biniam Girmay and Mathieu van der Poel try a move in the peloton!

And more riders are also trying to get away, too. EF, Cofidis, Israel, Eolo making moves.

Just 15 seconds between the attackers and the peloton.

The move out front is: Valerio Conti (Astana Qazaqstan), Lennard Kämna (Bora-Hansgrohe), Davide Villella (Cofidis), Rein Taaramäe (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert), Gijs Leemreize (Jumbo-Visma), Mauri Vansevenant (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl), Sylvain Moniquet (Lotto Soudal), Juan Pedro López (Trek-Segafredo)

155km to go

The peloton is calming down now and it looks like they're happy with the breakaway.

Lilian Calmejane (AG2R Citroën) is going solo in the chase

153km to go

Rémy Rochas (Cofidis), Diego Camargo (EF Education-EasyPost), Alexander Cataford (Israel-Premier Tech), Erik Fetter (Eolo-Kometa), Stefano Oldani (Alpecin-Fenix) have made it across to the breakaway.

Calmejane is 10 seconds back from the break and struggling to get across. He looks frustrated on the bike.

The peloton is 4:30 down.

Simon Yates is back at the race doctor's car. He's getting some spray on his knee after falling earlier.

150km to go

Calmejane makes it across after a big effort.

Simone Ravanelli (Drone Hopper-Androni Giocattoli) is chasing the break at a minute down. The peloton is 6:30 down.

Breaking: Miguel Angel López is reportedly out of the Giro d'Italia

The Colombian was back with his team car a while ago. We're not sure exactly what has happened.

Rai's on-bike reporters suggest that he has quit, though there is no official confirmation as of yet.

And now it's official. López has withdrawn from the Giro.

We've seen shots of López holding his left leg and riding ahead of the race ambulance right at the back of the convoy. Those photographs suggest his abandon is injury-related.

Astana has confirmed his abandon due to a left hip injury which has hindered him during the last few days.

140km to go

9:40 between the peloton and the breakaway currently.

López was lying 34th overall, 53 seconds down on maglia rosa Van der Poel, heading into today's stage.

He would've been among the favourites both on Etna and on the final GC. A big blow for him and Astana, who will now look to Vincenzo Nibali, David de la Cruz, Joe Dombrowski, and Valerio Conti (in today's breakaway) for results.

Up front, the break's advantage goes out to 10:30 and Vansevenant is the virtual maglia rosa.

138km to go

Davide Bais (Eolo-Kometa) stops for a shoe change.

Ineos Grenadiers are working in the peloton currently. Sicilian rider Salvatore Puccio takes it up at the head of the group.

Lotto Soudal and Trek-Segafredo have a couple of riders lined up behind Puccio, too.

135km to go

11:10 for the breakaway. Things a bit calmer after the drama of the moto crash and López's withdrawal.

Our story on López...

Miguel Ángel López abandons Giro d'Italia – hip injury forces Colombian out part-way through stage 4

Bahrain and Movistar are also present up at the front of the peloton at the moment as Ineos lead.

There's still some (unclassified) climbing left to come in the middle of this stage. The break are almost at the start of the hill, which – at almost 800 metres altitude – is the highest point of the day aside from Etna.

After that, a long descent closer to sea level as they pass by Catania and then largely flat roads until the much-anticipated final climb of the day.

In short, maybe not so many thrills coming in the next few hours before Etna.

Simon Yates is at the rear of the peloton. He waves the TV moto past. 

He drops back to the team car to get a bottle. No drama there.

129km to go

10:25 between the break and peloton. It looks like that 11-minute gap might be the biggest of the day as Ineos work at gradually getting things under control.

10 minutes for the break now as the gap keeps coming down, bit-by-bit.

It's still Ineos, Bahrain, and Movistar lined up at the head of the peloton at the moment. Nine minutes up to the breakaway.

174 men left in the Giro after the abandon of López and the abandon of Jan Tratnik earlier in the race.

Here's our story on the crash which involved a moto earlier on today, including a video of the incident.

Motorbike causes crash at Giro d'Italia – vehicle clips roadside furniture, bringing down several riders

The breakaway riders are still all working well together so far. There shouldn't be any issues until they hit Etna, in any case. They only have two intermediate sprints to battle over until then, and both are some way away yet.

122km to go

8:25 between break and peloton currently.

Aimé De Gendt (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert) stops with a mechanical but he's quickly back up and running and back in the peloton.

Mark Cavendish and several QuickStep teammates are at the rear of the peloton. The riders are near the top of that unclassified hill now, so there's little else to trouble the sprinters until the final climb.

A look at some of the numbers in the fight for the breakaway today, though Denz ended up not making the main break.

115km to go

Eight minutes for the breakaway as they begin the long, equally gradual, run downhill.

It's still an eight-minute gap as the riders get close to the 100km to go mark.

Philippa York analysis: Yates and Carapaz on top before Giro's first mountain test

The battle to take – or avoid – pink, and the question of who can beat Cavendish

Luca Rastelli (Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) has a small crash in the peloton and gets going again with one of his race numbers hanging off. He seems more frustrated than anything.

100km to go

8:10 is the current gap. Ben Swift (Ineos Grenadiers) and Jasha Sütterlin (Bahrain Victorious) sharing the workload at the front of the peloton.

Some power numbers from stage contender Richard Carapaz, who has been in the peloton all day, and Lilian Calmejane, who fought to bridge across to the breakaway...

Carapaz – Avg watts: 200, Max watts: 780, Avg speed: 35.6kph

Calmejane – Avg watts: 270, Max watts: 960, Avg speed: 38.5kph

Some scenery from the Sicilian countryside during today's stage.

We're still around 65km from the start of the climb up Etna at the moment. It's a quiet period of the stage with little reason for any major action here.

How to watch the 2022 Giro d'Italia – Live streaming

83km to go

7:40 for the breakaway. Everybody is all together in both break and peloton right now.

Richard Carapaz, one of the favourites for the win here on Etna (and for the GC), has a new bike today. Gone is the largely gold Pinarello Dogma F and in comes one with much subtler gold trim. 

Ineos claim that they've saved some weight with the changes made to the bike. We should see it – and Carapaz – in flight later on today.

Carapaz ditches gold Pinarello to save weight, but it's not as simple as it seems

The time gap to the break has been largely stable at around the eight-minute mark for a while now. There's no big upping of the pace just yet.

Simon Yates is off the back of the peloton once again. Maybe another trip to the team car or race doctor's car for a check.

70km to go

7:30 between break and peloton now. Yates is back in the peloton.

The riders – break and peloton – are on the largely flat run towards the intermediate sprint at Paternò now.

Yates has had a troubled day so far, having been caught up in that crash earlier on.

As second place in GC, though, he'd be the favourite to take the pink jersey on Etna, though a surviving breakaway might stand in his way – if he'd even want to take on the burdens of the race lead at this early stage.

'Multiple ways it can pan out' on Etna as Yates poised to take pink – BikeExchange-Jayco director White says Etna 'will show us who's in form and who's not'

60km to go

It's still Bahrain and Ineos leading the way in the peloton. We can expect some fireworks from their leaders Mikel Landa and Richard Carapaz on Etna.

A shot of the fans lining the road a little earlier on today.

52km to go

Still no real change in the overall situation. The peloton chases the breakaway at 7:45 down.

25km to go until the riders hit the start of Mount Etna.

Now Trek-Segafredo take it up at the head of the peloton. Finally, a change in the race situation.

45km to go

More teams heading to the front, too. The break's advantage has immediately gone down to 7:05.

EF Education-EasyPost, Movistar, Ineos Grenadiers, Bahrain Victorious, Trek-Segafredo all spread across the road at the front.

Following that burst of acceleration, the gap has stabilised at 7:05 for now.

42km to go

Around 7km to go until the break reach the intermediate sprint at Paternò. The road will already be rising before that point, though.

The gap is just under seven minutes now.

40km to go

The break are almost five kilometres up the road, almost seven minutes in terms of time.

Rochas, Moniquet, and Vansevenant at the head of today's breakaway.

Guillaume Martin spoke before the race about Mount Etna. He has recently spent three weeks at a training camp on the mountain, and climbed it 15 times.

The Frenchman said that he rode this ascent five or six times in total.

37km to go

The break race through the large crowds in Paternò. Calmejane leads the way at the intermediate sprint.

6:40 back to the peloton.

Now the peloton rides through Paternò.

The riders are well on their way uphill now but there's still some time to go until they start the actual climb of Etna.

Andrii Ponomar (Drone Hopper-Androni Giocattoli) is caught in a crash in the peloton as they head around a roundabout. He sits on the grass after going down.

30km to go

Cavendish drops off the back of the peloton accompanied by three QuickStep teammates, Mørkøv, Van Lerberghe, and Serry.

The gap between break and peloton is currently around the 6:10 mark.

Ineos, Bahrain, Trek, Movistar, EF, Bora, Cofidis across the front of the peloton.

Caleb Ewan is dropped from the peloton.

27km to go

Oldani makes a move from the breakaway!

Oldani solo through Biancavilla on the way to the second intermediate sprint. Just a few kilometres to go until he starts Etna.

Here's a look at Mount Etna. It's a long one...

Oldani reportedly has 40 seconds on the rest of the break already.

Fighting for position in the peloton as they head towards the base of Etna. Various teams up front in Biancavilla.

22km to go

Oldani and the break have started the climb proper, meanwhile.

Trek, Bora, Movistar, EF, Ineos spread across the road as they race towards the climb.

20km to go

Oldani hits the 20km mark. 

López attacks from the break behind.

Van der Poel is out the back of the peloton. The pink jersey will change hands tonight.

The chasing group behind Oldani is split in two now, though things look to be coming back together. 

19km to go

Oldani is now 45 seconds up on the rest of the break.

The peloton is a further 5:30 down.

Several of the riders in the break have dropped off the back of the chase group.

Kämna, López, Taaramäe, Moniquet, Vansevenant, Leemreize are left chasing.

Conti, Villella, Rochas, Camargo, Cataford, Fetter, Calmejane all dropped from the chase behind Oldani.

Van der Poel passes the 20km to go mark accompanied by several teammates.

16km to go

Still around 45 seconds for Oldani, though that time is dropping.

Bora, Trek, Movistar, Ineos still spread across the front of the peloton. The pace isn't high.

The chase group behind Oldani are all working well together at the moment.

15km to go

Oldani's advantage is reportedly up to just over 50 seconds now. 

Ineos Grenadiers have now taken control at the head of the peloton with the whole team.

Oldani, meanwhile, is still resisting the chase and even extending his advantage. He has almost a minute at the moment. 

Five more minutes back to the peloton.

White jersey wearer Matteo Sobrero is dropped from the peloton.

Oldani is in the virtual pink jersey here. He'd need 1:03 on Vansevenant to take over the race lead.

López attacks from the chase. Leemreize is in trouble.

12km to go

Ineos still in control of the peloton.

López is closing in on Oldani, around 30 seconds down.

López has Oldani in his sights now.

11km to go

Oldani has 17 seconds on López and 30 on the rest of the chase. The peloton is 5:35 down.

10km to go

López makes the catch up front!

Now López rides past and Oldani is dropped from the front. 27 seconds to the rest of the break.

Still quite some way to go here but López is looking good. 5:20 back to the peloton.

A shot of Oldani on the attack before he was caught and passed by the Spaniard.

9km to go

Oldani is dropping back towards the chase quickly. 20 seconds up to López.

Leemreize is dropped from the breakaway chasers. 45 seconds from them to López.

Ineos are still in control. At the back of the peloton, Tom Dumoulin is dropped!

The Dutchman will clearly not be challenging for the GC at this Giro d'Italia...

8km to go

Oldani caught by the chasers.

Kämna makes a move in the chase, while Oldani and Taaramäe are dropped.

7km to go

López still has 40 seconds on the chases. 4:25 to the peloton.

Ineos still with four in front of Carapaz. It looks like around 30 riders left in the peloton now.

Kämna now solo in the chase behind López. He's 25 seconds down.

5km to go

20 seconds between López and Kämna. The rest of the chasers are a minute down.

Vincenzo Nibali is dropped.

Probably fewer than 20 men in the peloton now.

Kämna is slowly chipping away at the lead. It's down to 17 seconds behind López.

3km to go

Kämna now 10 seconds back. López still pushing on. 

Kämna makes the catch with 2.5km to go.

The German is 1:55 down on GC, while López is 1:12 down.

López could still take pink even if Kämna drops him before the finish.

2km to go

A few riders disrupt the Ineos train with a small acceleration but it's back to the front for the British squad pretty quickly.

Taaramäe is 35 seconds down on the two leaders. Him making it across is not impossible but it is improbable.

No action from the peloton yet.

1km to go

Kämna and López head into the final kilometre and it's mostly flat or rolling.

Kämna is on the front.

López is set to take the maglia rosa here, regardless of the result.

The Spaniard messes up the final turn!

It's easy for Kämna...

Lennard Kämna takes the stage win! Juan Pedro López takes second and the pink jersey.

Rein Taaramäe crosses the line in third place at just around 35 seconds down.

The remains of the breakaway also heading to the line.

No attacks in the peloton at all.

Ineos lead it around the final corner.

Carapaz launches a sprint for the line in the final few hundred metres.

No separation in the GC group. Domenico Pozzovivo trails in a few seconds behind.

Sivakov also loses time after dropping following his work for Carapaz.

Nibali and Dumoulin will lose a big chunk of time here, of course.

A look at the results from the stage.

Here's what Lennard Kämna had to say after the finish...

"It was a super hard day, especially the last climb. It was really long and hard. I almost thought I lost it when López had more than 30 seconds and I could just make it to bridge. I just made it. Then I tried to recover a little bit for the sprint and it worked out really well.

"Let me say it like this – maybe we had a silent agreement [for the win/pink jersey].

"I'm so happy to already have the stage win in the pocket. For our team it's super great to have an early victory that relieves a lot of pressure. I think for us everything is on the right way."

Kämna celebrates his stage victory atop Mount Etna.

The GC outlook...

Carapaz, Bardet, Bilbao, Almeida, Landa, Valverde, CIccone, Arensman, Hindley, Porte, Kelderman, Hamilton, Sosa, Buitrago, Buchmann, Yates, Carthy – all in the main GC group

Pozzovivo lost 19 seconds, Sivakov lost 55 seconds, Martin lost 1:31, Nibali lost 2:15, Mollema lost 2:24, Dumoulin lost 6:33.

Here's what Juan Pedro López had to say after the finish...

"I'm so happy today for taking the [pink] jersey. I don't believe this moment and I need to enjoy tomorrow, today, and every moment with the jersey.

"I tried to go on the hardest part because that's where I can make the difference. I tried but Kämna took me in the last two or three kilometres and we fought for the sprint, but I stayed near the [crowds] and nothing. I tried to fight for the victory but it was so difficult. But I have the jersey and I'm so happy now.

"I don't know how many days but for sure I will enjoy it day-by-day with the jersey, I enjoy it today when I put on the jersey, tomorrow and every stage that I have the jersey."

Emotional scenes at Trek-Segafredo as 24-year-old López takes the maglia rosa...

On a big day for the breakaway, López gets the pink jersey while Kämna celebrates the stage victory.

We'll have plenty of news and reaction to come this evening, including from Carapaz, Dumoulin, Nibali, López, and Kämna...

Former pink jersey Mathieu van der Poel finished in 97th place at 22:54 down on Kämna. We'll certainly see more of him during the Giro, though.

Giro d'Italia: GC standings after stage 4

Juan Pedro López takes pink jersey after breakaway day on Mount Etna

Here's our full report with full results and a photo gallery for stage 4

Giro d'Italia: Kämna wins stage 4 atop Mount Etna

Here's a look at the final kilometre as Kämna and López went for victory on Mount Etna.