Giro d'Italia: Dumoulin triumphs atop Oropa

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Tom Dumoulin (Sunweb) stormed his way to the finish line atop the Oropa climb to win stage 14 of the Giro d'Italia at the head of a high-powered group, following a hard-fought climb up the final kilometres of the ascent. He out-gunned Ilnur Zakarin (Katusha-Alpecin) and Mikel Landa (Sky) on the finishing straight after reeling in a sustained attack by Movistar's Nairo Quintana, who finished fourth, 14 seconds back.

The stage win pushed race leader Dumoulin further ahead of his chief rivals on the overall leaderboard. Including the bonus seconds he claimed at the line, Dumoulin picked up a total of 24 seconds on Quintana and 53 on Bahrain-Merida's Vincenzo Nibali. The Dutchman now leads Quintana by 2:47 with FDJ's Thibaut Pinot sitting third on GC at 3:25.

A three-man break group dominated the flat portion of the stage, with the only action of the day coming once the climb started. Attack followed attack, but no one was able to get away for long. Quintana made his decisive move with four kilometres to go, followed by Zakarin. Dumoulin had been holding himself fairly far back, giving the impression he was perhaps on his limit. But he soon appeared at the front of a small group including Yates, Nibali, Landa and Zakarin, who had been dropped by Quintana.

The Colombian had no more than about a 14 second lead, and Dumoulin used his time trial skills to move up, catch, and pass Quintana. The two, together with Zakarin and Landa, rode up the final kilometre with Quintana slowly dropping back. Zakarin moved to the front with only a few hundred meters left, but Dumoulin dug deep and passed him within sight of the finish line, to win by three seconds.

Though Quintana, Pinot, Yates, Nibali and Kruijswijk all lost time on the race leader, the biggest loser was no doubt Dumoulin's compatriot Bauke Mollema (Trek Segafredo) who toppled off the podium, going from third place to sixth, 4:32 down. Even the mountain jersey changed hands. Omar Fraile (Dimension Data) fell back early on the climb, and the blue jersey changed over to the broad shoulders of stage winner Dumoulin.

How it unfolded

The sun was shining at the start in Castellania as the peloton took off on the shortest road stage of this year’s Giro d’Italia, only 131 km. Roughly the first 100 km of the day were flattish before the finishing climb, so an escape group was expected.

Many tried to get away but no one was successful or allowed to go. The pace was high in the opening half an hour and the GC favourites all sat calmly in the field, while others made their flight attempts. It took some 30 km, but a group finally was allowed to get away. Natnael Berhane (Dimension Data), Sergey Lagutin (GazProm-RusVelo) and Daniel Martinez (Willier Trestina) moved away as the peloton relaxed.

The gap was never much over the two minute mark. And so it continued for some 80 kilometres. With 22 km to go, and the finishing climb looming, the GC riders’ teams started lining up at the front. There was still no rush to catch the three leaders, even though the gap was by then under a minute. They were eventually brought back with just under 18 km left.

Nearing the foot of the climb, Bahrain Merida moved to the front apparently looking to set things up for Nibali. They were soon joined by Trek-Segafredo for Bauke Mollema, with Team Sunweb keeping an eye on them all.

Movistar led the charge up, as riders started falling off the back and there were numerous crashes along the way, including one by Lotto Soudal’s Adam Hansen. In fact, José Joaquín Rojas and Gorka Izagirre were so strong they unintentionally opened a gap, with Diego Rosa of Sky giving chase. When the two Movistar riders realised what they had done, they pulled up, but Rosa kept on going.

Surprisingly mountains classification leader Fraile fell off the back of the field early on. Movistar still led the reduced field, and the Sky rider was caught again. Maglia Rose Dumoulin was not near the front of the field.

With 5.5 km to go, Igor Anton (Dimension Data) was the next to jump, with Zakarin, Yates and Pozzovivo leading the chase, and all were together again. Winner Anacona (Movistar) pulled the group along, until Yates moved to the front. Yates fell back though and Pozzovivo attacked. And with four km to go, Quintana and Zakarin went off the front together. Dumoulin was too far back to successfully react. Quintana and Zakarin moved up. Dumoulin appeared again at last, leading a small group. That was too much for Quintana, who took off again.

The big Dutchman didn’t panic but steadily rode his own rhythm, leading his small group of Nibali, Zakarin, Yates and Landa in chase. Both Mollema and Pinot had dropped back, and soon both Yates and Nibali were not able to stay with the group.

Meter by meter, Dumoulin neared the Colombian, catching and passing him with 1.5km to go. Dumoulin kept going, but Quintana, Landa and Zakarin went with him. Zakarin moved into the lead with some 200 meters to go and Dumoulin gave furious chase and moved into the lead with some 25 meters to go to take the win. Quintana finished a desolate fourth, more than 10 seconds down.

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