Hello and welcome to live coverage of stage 16 of the Giro d'Italia, a 177km mountainous slog from Pinzolo to Aprica that features the fearsome Mortirolo pass and four other categorised peaks in the Alps.

One of the Bardiani-CSF riders off the back of the pelotol has got their rain jacket caught in his spokes. That's always the peril of derobing while riding. The rain, you see, has eased off and it looks to have cleared.

Ryder Hesjedal is clearly on a good day: the Cannondale-Garmin rider - winner of the 2012 Giro, lest you forget - has broken clear of his fellow escapees. Probably the right move: something needed to be done, what with the gap coming down fast.

Ryder Hesjedal leads the break through the intermediate sprint - they're almost half way through this climb. The gap is down to 1:43 thanks to the pace-setting of Tinkoff-Saxo.

It's all Tinkoff-Saxo on the front for their man Alberto Contador, whose pink jersey is partially obscured by an unzipped black rain jacket. They seem determined not to let Astana dictate play today as they did on Sunday's first stage in the Alps.

The 11 leaders start the Cat.3 climb to Aprica - the first of two ascents, the second being the final. It's only about 10km long and has a maximum gradient of 6% and so most of the damage today will be done on the climb that splits this dual ascent - the Mortirolo. The gap is currently 2:30.

The leaders pass through the feed zone at Edolo. They've now completed this long descent and will soon start the climb to Aprica. En route, there will be the first of two intermediate sprints.

The likes of Hesjedal, Pellizotti, Zardini and Clarke have been fairly active in this year's Giro - especially the Italian veteran from Androni Sidermec, who almost won the stage last week when Paolo Tiralongo came through to take the spoils. The gap is 2:20 for these 11 leaders.

The rain looks to have eased up a little as this break continue this long descent towards the feed zone and the start of the first ascent to Aprica. Very localised showers, it seems, because the peloton are being thoroughly poured on whereas the break is in sun and on dry roads - even though the gap is just two minutes.

We pick up the race live now midway through the descent of the Tonale. Tinkoff-Saxo are controlling matters for the pink jersey and the 11-man break have almost two minutes advantage to play with ahead of those two ascents to Aprica, which sandwich the meat filling that is the Mortirolo.

It's Ruben Fernandez, the Movistar team-mate of blue jersey Benat Intxausti, who takes maximum points over the summit of the Passo del Tonale. They have about 1:30 over the peloton and lone chaser Simon Clarke has almost bridged over.

Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEdge) was chasing down the lead group on the Passo Tonale. His team tried something with Esteban Chaves earlier on - in that move with Geschke - but it didn't work out.

A group of 11 riders formed after the descent ahead of the second climb. They were: Ryder Hesjedal (Cannondale-Garmin), Nikolay Mihaylov (CCC Sprandi Polkowice), Przemyslaw Niemiec (Lampre-Merida), Ruben Fernandez (Movistar), Sander Armee (Lotto Soudal), Franco Pellizotti (Androni-Sidermec), Fabio Felline (Trek Factory Racing), David de la Cruz (Etixx-QuickStep), Edoardo Zardini (Bardiani-CSF) and Brent Bookwalter (BMC).

Carlos Betancur (Ag2rR-La Mondiale) took maximum points over the top ahead of Franco Pellizotti (Androni-Sidermec) and Benat Intxausti (Movistar).

A number of riders tried their luck soon after the start, including Simon Geschke (Giant Alpecin) who is a threat to Benat Intxausti's blue KOM jersey. But it was no can do. Meanwhile, a group of riders were distanced early - including the red jersey Elia Viviani (Team Sky).

It was almost straight away onto the first of today's five climbs, the Cat.2 Campo Carlo Magno.

The remaining 174 riders rolled out of Pinzolo at midday UK time under light rain.

Many believe that the race for the pink jersey is over - but we still have six stages to go, just the one of which is a processional roll into Milan. If Astana can pile on the pressure early on, then attack the isolated Spaniard on the Mortirolo today, then we could see some fireworks. It's likely that they will try - but debatable if they can succeed. Contador does indeed look very, strong - certainly far stronger than any of the comptition out there.

Porte's withdrawal opens the door to team-mate Leopold Konig, who is currently fifth on GC at 6:36. If only the Czech rider hadn't crashed and lost two minutes last week - then he'd be right up in the mix in the battle for a podium finish. A reminder that Spain's Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) leads the race by 2:35 over Italy's Fabio Aru (Astana) and 4:19 over Costa Rica's Andre Amador (Movistar).

The big news from the rest day was the withdrawal of Team Sky's Richie Porte, who decided to call it a day after a horror second week saw him puncture, crash, plummet down the standings and injure his knee. The Australian failed to stop the rot in the ITT and then shipped a hefty slice of time in the opening Alpine stage to drop to almost 36 minutes down on GC. He'll now concentrate on getting fit in time to help Chris Froome's Tour de France campaign.