Giro d'Italia: Chris Froome secures overall victory at Cervinia

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Team Sky's Chris Froome clinched his first Giro d'Italia victory on Saturday, holding off attacks from his rival Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) on the final summit finish of the race at Cervinia on stage 20. Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott) took the stage victory from the breakaway on his 34th birthday, his third career win at the Giro d'Italia, salvaging something from a miserable closing weekend for his team.

Robert Gesink (LottoNL-Jumbo) recovered from a mechanical to finish second, 2:16 behind, while Felix Grosschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) rounded off the podium in third, 2:42 down.

Miguel Ángel López (Astana) moved up to third overall, benefitting from an Alpine implosion from Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), who cracked in a similar manner to Nieve's teammate Simon Yates on the Colle delle Finestre 24 hours previously.

Pinot aside, there was a wait for the day's GC action - in contrast to Friday. Dumoulin, the 2017 champion, made his move midway up the final climb to Cervinia, but despite his best efforts, he couldn't manufacture any gaps to the maglia rosa wearer Froome, and was even dropped himself at one point.

A combination of exhaustion from the efforts of the previous stage to Bardonecchia, as well as the comparatively shallow slopes on the road to Cervinia, meant that Dumoulin's slim chances of over-hauling the 40-second gap evaporated to nothing.

The result means that Froome will - barring any disaster tomorrow - join Eddy Merckx and Bernard Hinault as the only riders to hold the trophy in all three Grand Tours at the same time. It will come with an asterisk though, as Froome's pending salbutamol case could mean that both his Giro and 2017 Vuelta a España victories are taken away.

"Obviously there were attacks that I had to follow in the finale but I felt very much in control and very capable of following today," said Froome. "I think everyone had such a hard day yesterday that I think nobody really had the extra legs to go anywhere."

"This Giro has been brutal, absolutely brutal," he added. "When someone tends to have a bad here it's not just a matter of 30 seconds or one minute, it's 10, 15 minutes. It's a brutal race."

Meanwhile, Nieve told of how his thoughts turned to today's stage after the cataclysmic events of Friday's stage.

"After yesterday's stage I definitely started to look forward to today," he said. "I think we did a really great Giro d'Italia. We've had a really good team right the way through. We've won plenty of stages now, and had a good cohesion throughout the team. Romain [Kreuziger] helped me a lot in the breakaway and I'm really happy to get the stage win."

Froome's GC victory comes 46 seconds ahead of Dumoulin, while López's third place plus white young rider's jersey at 4:57 rounds off a consistent Spring for the Colombian. Froome also takes the blue king of the mountains jersey, becoming the first man to win that and the overall since Marco Pantani in 1998.

How it happened

The final meaningful GC-related stage of the Giro, stage 20 was another monster, running 214km from the Alpine town of Susa into the mountains and the finish at the resort of Cervinia. With Chris Froome holding a 40 -econd lead over Tom Dumolin going into the day, as well as Thibaut Pinot holding the same advantage over fourth-placed man Miguel Ángel López, it would be the last chance for a GC shakeup before Rome.

129 flat kilometres opened the stage, with two intermediate sprints coming before any climbing on the day. Then it was back into the mountains and the Aosta Valley region with the Col Tsecore. A 16km climb with an average of 7.7 per cent, the Giro first-timer featured stretches in the double digits to soften the legs further after Friday's carnage.

After a 10km descent into the valley it was straight back up again, this time to the Col du Saint Pan-taléon, a steady climb that regularly features on the famous U23 race the Giro della Valle d'Aoste. Measuring 16.5km at 7.1 per cent, it would be tough enough to act as a launchpad for any last-ditch attacks.

The final climb of the stage and the Giro was the diesel slog up to Cervinia. Flat stretches over the 18.2km - including 2km to the line - level out the average gradient to a manageable 5.3 per cent. It's the climb where Ryder Hesjedal took pink from Joaquim Rodriguez in 2012.

The break

A fast start saw a large early break of 27 riders get away. Maglia ciclamino Elia Viviani (Quick Step Floors) was there, as were Matej Mohorič, Giovanni Visconti (both Bahrain-Merida), Giulio Ciccone (Bardiani-CSF), Michael Woods (EF-Drapac), Gianluca Brambilla (Trek-Segafredo), Valerio Conti (UAE-Team Emirates), Grosschartner, Gesink and the Mitchelton-Scott duo of Mikel Nieve and Romain Kreuziger.

Predictably, Viviani took the points at the intermediate sprints, bolstering his lead over Sam Ben-nett (Bora-Hansgrohe) further. As the break hit the first climb, Kreuziger and Nieve put on the pres-sure, shelling riders from the break left and right.

Back in the peloton Astana set a fast pace for López while former maglia rosa Yates was dropped, compounding a miserable end to his Giro d'Italia campaign. Almost six minutes up the road Conti pushed the pace in the break, leading to a selection of around 10 riders remaining at the top of the Tsecore.

After Ciccone picked up the points and the extra cash prize, Mohoric motored away on the de-scent. The Slovenian, already a stage winner this year, showcased his downhill skills once again, quickly opening a 30 second gap.

Pinot runs out of gas

Hitting the Saint Pantaléon, Mohoric was still out in front, but back in the peloton there would be more drama. With Astana still massed on the front, their aim was to shed Pinot and claim third overall for López. 41km from the end of the stage, only a handful of kilometres into the second climb of the day, it was done.

With no forewarning of any trouble for the Frenchman, the helicopters showed him off the back and surrounded by teammates. Clearly suffering from Friday's efforts in the chase, the Tour of the Alps winner was spent.

Despite his loyal lieutenant Sébastien Reichenbach's encouragement, the immediate instinct was that it was over for Pinot - a podium place lost as he fell over a minute behind within a kilometre of dropping.

Up front Mohoric was caught, and quickly dropped as Nieve led a chase group. Nearing the top of the climb, the Basque went it alone, cresting the summit eight minutes ahead of the peloton. With Grosschartner somewhere in the middle, a trio of Ciccone, Gesink and Brambilla chased almost two minutes back.

The big finale

With Pinot gone for good, Astana took their pacesetting down a notch, leading to a lull in the ac-tion until Movistar took it up on the lower slopes of Cervinia. Then, as Nieve continued to gain on his chasers, it was a waiting game. Dumoulin had to try something, but when?

The first attack came 9km out, right after a short 12 per cent stretch - the toughest section of the climb. Dumoulin had Froome on his rear wheel immediately, with only Davide Formolo (Bora-Hansgrohe), Domenico Pozzovivo (Bahrain-Merida), Richard Carapaz (Movistar) and López able to follow, along with Dumoulin's teammate Sam Oomen.

Punch and counter-punch followed, with neither man able to shed the other. 6km from the line Dumoulin tried again, heightening the tension going on the offensive in a tunnel, unsighted. On the other side Froome countered, with Dumoulin unable to match.

The Dutchman shook his head as Froome rode away with the rest of the group in tow. With 5km left to race, the fight for pink was all but over. Over the closing kilometres Carapaz tried in vain to overhaul López's 47-second advantage for white and third overall, but he couldn't shed his fellow South American.

Dumoulin took advantage of a slowing in the group to make his way back, but there would be no more attacks. He came in with the select group, led by a sprinting Froome - his Giro victory assured - alongside superdomestique Wout Poels.

Up the mountain, Mitchelton-Scott got their consolation prize - and it was a big one - with Nieve crossing the line solo for the Australian team's fifth stage victory of the race.

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