Buongiorno and welcome to live coverage of stage 9 of the Giro d'Italia - an Apennine mountain-top showdown on the Gran Sasso d'Italia in a long 225km stage from Pesco Sannita.

If you missed that bizarre Froome uphill crash yesterday, check it out here. It's clearly a case of when it rains it pours for Froome. He looked out of sorts as soon as the bad weather arrived yesterday, knocking into team-mate Sergio Henao at the start of the climb, losing a front wheel on that corner with 6km remaining, then shoulder-barging George Bennett while looking at his stem and pedalling a frantic spinning cadence. He's not the most elegant at the most of the time, but he really does look uncharacteristically troubled in this Giro. That said, he's still only 1'10" down, and if he can weather the storm and come good in the final week, perhaps the Giro-Tour double is still a possibility?

The gap has ballooned to a huge 6'05" for the 14 leaders - and so Gianluca Brambilla is just 35 seconds away from being the virtual maglia rosa. A reminder of the current top 10 today below. Carapaz moved up above Froome and into the top 10 at the expense of Fabio Aru who is bumped down to 11th. Pinot, who was third, moved ahead of Pozzovivo into fourth place thanks to those four bonus seconds. No change between Yates, Dumoulin and Chaves in the virtual podium positions.

Just to confirm that it's not Jens Debusschere - or both Debusschere and his fellow Belgian Tim Wellens - but just Wellens in the break from Lotto-Fix All today, so we have 14 riders out ahead, not 15. Yesterday Tim Wellens was unable to add to his stage 4 win thanks to a crash ahead of the final decisive climb - see this video below.

Talking of yesterday, why not watch the daily highlights and analysis video from our friends at GCN? In the stage 8 recap, Dan Lloyd discusses Richard Carapaz's magic and Chris Froome's continued troubles with the journalist Will Fotheringham.

The gap is up to 3'15" for the escapees now. The best placed rider here on GC is Brambilla, who has been a bit off-form this year since his move to Trek-Segafredo. The Italian is 6'40" down on race leader Simon Yates in 32nd position and he could rise up the overall standings today if things go his way. Although we said the same thing about Jan Polanc yesterday...

It looks like Boivin's time riding 'chasse patate' has come to an end - he's back with the pack now. There's confusion whether Lotto-Fix All have Wellens or Debusschere in the break - or both. Perhaps this is a GPS issue. We're hearing from race radio that there are 14 riders in the break and that it's Wellens, but the team say it's Debusschere. Who knows? We'll find out soon...

The 15 leaders have around two minutes on the pack with one rider doing his best to bridge over - it's Canadian Guillaume Boivin (Israel Cycling Academy). He was very active over the first few stages of the race, particularly in Israel.

Our 15 leaders are: Mickael Cherel (Ag2R-La Mondiale), Davide Ballerini and Fausto Masnada (Androni-Giocattoli), Manuele Boaro and Giovanni Visconti (Bahrain Merida), Simone Andreetta (Bardiani CSF), Cesare Benedetti (Bora-Hansgrohe), Tim Wellens and Jens Debusschere (Lotto-Fix All), Nathneal Berhane (Dimension Data), Hugh Carthy (EF Education First-Drapac), Maxim Belkov (Katusha-Alpecin), Gianluca Brambilla and Laurent Didier (Trek-Segafredo) and Alex Turrin (Wilier Triestina).

As to be expected, there's a flurry of attacks from the outset of today's stage - with around a dozen riders currently off the front. Yesterday it looked like the break would go all the way but the last man standing, Koen Bouwman, ended up being caught by Carapaz inside the final kilometre. Can a break stick today?

A reminder of the classification jerseys today: Simon Yates is in pink, his Mitchelton-Scott team-mate Esteban Chaves is in blue, Elia Viviani of Quick-Step Floors is in ciclamino and yesterday's winner Richard Carapaz (Movistar) is in white.

It's an early start today ahead of six hours in the saddle for the remaining 171 riders in the race. And they're off!

Here's what the riders have in store today - with rolling roads, including the Cat.2 Roccaraso and Cat.2 climb to Calascio ahead of the final Cat.1 GC showdown on the 'Great Rock of Itay', which commemorates Marco Pantani's 1999 win - the last time the Giro visited this iconic climb in the Apennines.

Yesterday, Ecuador’s Richard Carapaz pulled off an audacious move to win Stage 8 of the Giro d’Italia in the rain at Montevergine as Britain’s Chris Froome recovered from a bizarre uphill crash on a slippery bend on the final climb. Movistar youngster Carapaz became the first rider from Ecuador to win a stage of a Grand Tour after dancing clear of the main field inside the final two kilometres of the 209km stage from Praia a Mare in south-west Italy.