Petrov powers to victory in L'Aquila

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In Italian aquila means eagle and on a day that paid tribute to the Abbruzzese town of L'Aquila, devastated by an earthquake last year, a star-studded break that soared high above the peloton swooped to destroy the status quo of this year's Giro d'Italia with an effort that lasted 242km and netted Katusha's Evgeni Petrov the stage win.

In so doing, Cervélo's Carlos Sastre and Team Sky captain Bradley Wiggins, who were both part of the day's successful break, put themselves back into contention on the general classification. The pair now re-enter the fight for overall honours after a disastrous few days for Sastre and a forgettable week for the Briton.

Sastre began the day 9:59 in arrears of race leader Alexandre Vinokourov, while Wiggins sat 10:54 behind. The Spaniard was one of the big winners and jumped 13 positions by day's end, now sitting in eighth, 7:09 behind new overall leader Richie Porte.

The Australian added the maglia rosa to the bianca variety he had been wearing thus, as one of the peloton's elder statesman was usurped by a member of the youth brigade.

Porte - a rookie professional, no less - started the day just 2:26 off Vinokourov's time and in L'Aquila he pulled on his first maglia rosa in his Giro d'Italia debut. Whilst his chances of taking the race lead were slim before last week's team time trial, today the Tasmanian's dreams were a reality as he stood on the podium in pink, 10 minutes clear of the Astana captain.

Petrov, who finished seventh overall in the 2007 Giro d'Italia, has experienced lean pickings since his success in Italy three years ago and the relief was palpable. "I'm very, very happy. I have to thank all my team, they helped me a lot today. Anna, I won!" he exclaimed after the finish.

For his delight, however, the Russian denied a local boy the win he had so desperately sought in his backyard. Taking second place on the stage was somewhat disappointing for Cataldo, who hails from the Abruzzo region and wanted to win near his home, but he put on a brave face and said he was satisfied with his efforts after spending much of yesterday in a three-man break.

"I did everything to be in the right place at the right time but just ran out of legs, Petrov flew past me and there was nothing I could do," the Quick Step rider told Italian television.

"If I hadn't got in the break yesterday I might have got it today but I think I raced as well as I could have done. I'm from near here and wanted to go on the attack on this stage," he continued. "Perhaps if I hadn't gone on the attack yesterday, I'd have been stronger today, but at least I got in the break."

A sense of the ridiculous

Just when you thought this year's Giro couldn't get more mixed up, along comes a 262km route with three GPM and buckets of rain. Whether the general classification riders thought they could have the day off defending duties or they made an honest mistake is unclear - all we know is that they surrendered their lead to a powerful break that took flight after 20km.

As the old saying goes: 'There's strength in numbers...' and today's escape group certainly had that in abundance. There was Richie Porte, Chris Anker Sorensen and Laurent Didier from Saxo Bank plus Bradley Wiggins, Michael Barry, Steve Cummings and Morris Possoni from Team Sky.

Stage winner Petrov had his Katusha teammate Giampaolo Caruso out front and Matteo Bono was Lampre-Farnese Vini's sole representative as was Matt Goss for HTC-Columbia, while Liquigas-Doimo had Valerio Agnoli, Tiziano Dall'Antonia and Robert Kiserlovski at the pointy end of the race.

Omega Pharma-Lotto was represented by Jan Bakelandts, Francis De Greef and Matthew Lloyd; Dario Cataldo and Jerome Pineau from Quick Step made their presence felt while Stefan Kruijswijk and Mauricio Ardila flew the flag for Rabobank.

Caisse d'Epargne was the best represented in the break with five riders - Andrey Amador, David Arroyo, Arnold Jeannesson, Vasil Kiryienka and Alberto Losada - while the aforementioned Sastre had teammates Marcel Wyss, Volodymir Gustov and Xavier Tondo for company.

Julien Fouchard and David Moncoutié made sure Cofidis had riders in the break, while Dominico Pozzovivo did the same for Colnago-CSF Inox; Giampaolo Cheula and Iban Mayoz were there for Footon-Servetto while David Millar and Dan Martin ensured Garmin-Transitions had a couple of quality guys in the escape.

With captain Stefano Garzelli behind them, Massimo Codol and Alessandro Donati represented Acqua e Sapone, Herbert Dupont and Alexander Efimkin were there for Ag2R-La Mondiale plus there was a significant Bbox Bouygues Telecom contingent, with Thomas Voeckler, Damien Gaudin and Yuri Trofimov adding their names as Linus Gerdemann and Matthias Russ kept Milram in with a chance.

While there were many in the break who didn't pose a threat to Vinokourov's ascendancy, Astana failed to react to those riders who could strike upon his lead. The result was clear for the likes of himself, Cadel Evans and Ivan Basso: prepare to make up time in the next 10 stages of racing.

"This has been a long day. They [the other favourites] were looking at me, they expected me to react," said Vinokourov. "It's not over. The Giro is still long. Now it will up to other teams to handle the responsibilities. People said Sastre was done after the Terminillo - that's not the case."

Having built a maximum lead of 17 minutes, with 50km-to-go the break's advantage remained at 13 minutes. And despite the approaching second category Capo di Valle, seemingly the perfect ground to turn on the gas and peg back the plucky escape, the gap to the gruppo maglia rosa remained at 12:54 as it crested the day's third GPM.

And after the summit, a sight for those who had witnessed the favourites smacking each other near the finish of Saturday's stage to Montalcino: Evans, Vinokourov, Garzelli, Nibali and Basso all swapping off on the front of the gruppo maglia rosa to keep the break's advantage manageable.

But up front the pace also climbed courtesy of the firepower within the break and the gap never really decreased; while the leaders approached 10km remaining in the stage, Vinokourov's group hit the 20km-to-go mark, a significant difference of almost 10km. At this point it was certain that someone from the escape would celebrate victory in L'Aquila - the question remained as to who that would be.

With 6.5 kilometres remaining Sastre kept the pace high to ensure his rise back up the overall standings before Dario Cataldo made a solo bid for the win. Having spent most of yesterday's 230km parcours in a three-man break you'd be forgiven for thinking he'd have little left in his legs.

Joined soon after by Gerdemann and Bakelandts, it was a case of deja vu for the Italian although it didn't last for long as the Belgian came down on a slow, flat, hairpin righthand turn that initiated the long uphill drag to the finish and the remainder of the group came back together - for all except Petrov.

From there it was anyone's game - he with the strongest legs would prevail and that rider was Katusha's man-of-the-moment. The Russian tried his luck and as the day would have it, he finished 50 metres ahead of Cataldo, with Sastre coming in for a race-rejuvenating third place and Wiggins fourth.