Hello and welcome to our live coverage of stage 18 of the Giro d'Italia!
A look at the profile for today's stage.
And the map of the stage.
Yesterday's stage saw race leader Isaac del Toro rebound from an off-day and add more time to his overall lead with a late attack.
Here's a look back at the stage 17 results and GC.
With just two mountain stages left, this Giro d'Italia still hangs in the balance – Analysis
Stage 17 showed that the maglia rosa can't be written off, but also that Isaac del Toro is far from safe in the mountains
The current GC standings at the Giro d'Italia 2025 after stage 17
Race leader Isaac del Toro bounces back with a vengeance, clinching a stage win and boosting his previously fragile GC lead
It's Richard Carapaz's birthday today! The Ecuadorian, Isaac del Toro's main rival for the maglia rosa, turns 32 today.
Polti-VisitMalta rider Alessandro Tonelli turns 33 today, too. He's in second place in both the intermediate sprint and fuga (kilometres in the breakaway) classifications after making the break in stages 1, 3, and 7. Will he be back on the attack today?
Juan Ayuso's future in the Giro is up in the air at the moment after being stung by a bee on his eye yesterday, reports Daniel Friebe.
The riders are just about to roll out to start the 4.2km neutral zone!
Proper racing gets underway in around 10 minutes.
The flag is about to drop to start stage 18!
Paleni only lasts a few kilometres out front before he's caught.
Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) among the latest riders on the move.
Ayuso started the stage but is reportedly riding at the rear of the peloton.
He's back at the team car.
No breakaway clear yet.
Felix Engelhardt (Jayco-AlUla) is also on the move with him.
More riders are coming across to them.
It's all flat roads for the first 30km today.
20 seconds for the attackers back to the peloton.
Kaden Groves, Luca Mozzato, Andrea Vendrame, Mirco Maestri among the other names in the move.
Fabio van den Bossche, Edoardo Zambanini, Remy Rochas, Francesco Busatto, Jon Barrenetxea, Matteo Moschetti, Edoardo Affini are also in there.
More riders, too. It's a large breakaway group. Wout van Aert is up there.
114km to go
Mathias Vacek, Cristian Scaroni and Ben Turner are up there, too. Now 55 seconds on the peloton.
Around 20 riders at the front.
The riders hit the first climb of the day, Parlasco. It's 7.6km at 6.2% average.
Ayuso is off the back again and at the team car.
It looks like he won't last in the race for much longer. He's dropping back through the cars.
Ayuso pulls up to a UAE van stopped at the side of the road. His Giro d'Italia is over.
Scaroni is a distant second in the mountain classification behind his teammate Lorenzo Fortunato.
34 riders up the road, not around 20 as was previously reported.
The full list has just come through and you can check above for all the names involved.
Dries De Bondt opens it up at Primaluna.
But Mads Pedersen comes past to lead across the line.
De Bondt continues in the lead of the intermediate sprint classification.
A shot of the riders racing alongside Lake Como earlier on today.
A bike change for Ben Turner and he's off the rear of the break.
The climb of the Colle Balisio is coming up now.
It's a third-category hill, the second climb of three on the stage.
A shot of the breakaway.
Another attack from Scaroni as the break nears the top of the climb.
And more points for him as he leads it over the top once again.
27 points for Scaroni today. He started the day on 125 to Fortunato's 355.
The gap to the peloton is only going up.
Mozzato, Turner, and Affini are off the back by two minutes currently.
Juan Ayuso abandons Giro d'Italia stage 18 after bee sting compounds knee injury woes
UAE Team Emirates-XRG contender drops back and quits after 30km
The 9km, 4.4% climb to Ravellino is up next.
Almost six minutes for the break now.
Another intermediate sprint at Galbiate comes partway up the hill.
Mads Pedersen nips out once again to beat De Bondt across the line.
69km to go
Groves and Pedersen still in the breakaway group. They're not going anywhere and will be favourites to win the stage.
There are lots of riders in the group who won't want a sprint, however, and Alpecin-Deceuninck and Lidl-Trek will have to cover a lot of attacks on the flat.
Scaroni once again led over the top of the climb and now Francesco Busatto is attacking on the descent.
Another shot of the riders by the lake.
Scaroni is now on 161 points to Fortunato's 355.
Now the break hits the Red Bull Kilometre.
They're at Sirtori, the last uphill stretch of the day before the flat run to the finish.
Manuele Tarozzi, Martin Marcellusi, and Remy Rochas attack off the front.
Now a massive 10 minutes back to the peloton.
'You could perhaps say that Pogačar is better on Tour of Flanders-like courses, but this is about a three-week race'
The attacking trio have been brought back by the rest of the break.
11 minutes between break and peloton now.
The gap is so large there's a chance the break might catch the peloton on the closing circuit today.
Q36.5 (??) and EF are working at the head of the peloton.
A group of eight riders going clear at the front of the break now
De Bondt, Hoole, De Pretto, Maestri, Planckaert, Van Baarle, Conci, and Pluimers lead the race onto the closing circuit.
25 seconds for the leaders.
Q36.5 continue to work at the head of the peloton.
Aside from Tom Pidcock, it's hard to remember much from them during this Giro, so maybe just reminding us all that they are still at the race.
28km to go
10:05 back to the peloton now and the breakaway attackers have 55 seconds on the rest of the move.
It looks like it's over for Pedersen, Groves and the rest of the breakaway now. They're losing time to the front.
Maestri, Denz, De Bondt in the move.
And now Denz goes it alone at the front.
2:30 back to the main break group.
10:50 to the peloton.
Denz has to hang on for a full lap in Cesano Maderno.
Pedersen back in the main breakaway group. He won't be winning today.
29 seconds for Denz now.
Attacks now flowing from behind.
Denz won two Giro stages from the break in Rivoli and Cassano Magnago two years ago, so he's no stranger to this.
He looks all set for a third stage victory now.
All Denz has to do is stay upright from here on out.
This win will be a nice consolation prize for Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe following Primož Roglič's abandon. Giulio Pellizzari still has a few stages to battle for a high GC position, too.
He can afford to celebrate in the closing metres.
Now we wait to see who wins the sprint for second place from the chase group.
De Pretto is leading the group towards the finish.
Conci opens the sprint.
It looks like Maestri came through to grab second at the line.
Planckaert took third just ahead of Magli.
Here's the stage result.
Denz celebrates his win.
The remainder of the break finished 3:40 down.
And the peloton came home at 13:51 down in the end.
Giro d'Italia: Nico Denz saves Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe's race with stage 18 victory
Maestri, Planckaert round out stage podium as breakaway wins the day
Nico Denz celebrates his stage win on the podium.
The current GC standings at the Giro d'Italia 2025 after stage 18
Race leader Isaac del Toro has an easy day as breakaway steals the show ahead of mountain showdown
Isaac del Toro continues in the maglia rosa tonight, as well as leading as best young rider in the white jersey.
Lorenzo Fortunato is the maglia azzurra and only needs to stay in the race until Rome to take that prize home.
It's the same story for maglia ciclamino Mads Pedersen. He's secure in the lead of that classification and just needs to get through the next three days.
161 riders finished today, with Ayuso the only man to DNF the stage.
Tomorrow the riders head back into the mountains for this brutal Alpine stage.
We'll have more news coming from stage 18 throughout the evening, so watch out for that.
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