Geraint Thomas soars into pink as Joao Almeida wins Stage 16 at Giro d’Italia, Primoz Roglic wobbles

Are you not entertained? After the second rest day of the Giro d’Italia was submerged by complaints of a muted GC battle amid the inclement weather of the second week, the fight for pink finally sparked into life in a mouth-watering Stage 16 to Monte Bondone where Joao Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) took a maiden win and Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) moved back into the race lead.

Slovenia’s Primoz Roglic (Jumbo Visma) was the big loser of the day after failing to build on the hefty groundwork put in his by his team-mates but battling back to take third place ahead of Irish revelation Eddie Dunbar (Team Jayco-AlUla).

If Jumbo Visma shred the peloton and sounded the death-knell for the remaining escapees up the road at the start of the long slog up Monte Bondone, it was Almeida’s UAE team who soon came to the fore and put everyone in a world of pain – including the pink jersey of Bruno Armirail (Groupama-FDJ).

Ably supported by Davide Formolo, Jay Vine and Sunday’s Stage 15 winner Brandon McNulty, Almeida then pulled the trigger with an attack inside the final 6km of the 23km climb to go clear of Thomas, Roglic, Dunbar and Sepp Kuss (Jumbo Visma).

Thomas then highlighted the chinks in Roglic’s armour by dropping the triple Vuelta winner and bridging over to Almeida, the white jersey, with 4km remaining. The pair combined well to stretch out their advantage before Almeida denied his rival what would have been a maiden stage win on the Giro with what was a first Giro triumph of his own.

With Frenchman Armirail coming home over four minutes back, Thomas, who has just four support riders after Pavel Sivakov became the latest Ineos star to abandon, leads Almeida by 18 seconds in the general classification. Roglic led Dunbar home 25 seconds down in third and now trails Thomas by 29 seconds.

In what is shaping up to be a three-horse race for pink, the new-look top five is completed by Italy’s Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious) at 2:50 and Ireland’s Dunbar at 3:03.

“I’m so happy – it’s a dream come true,” said 24-year-old Almeida, who had previously finished runner-up on four occasions in stages on the Giro. “After four years I was always so close and yet so far at the same time. Finally, I’ve got it. I don’t have the words to describe it.

“My team was amazing and they did a great job as always. I knew I was feeling good and I took the risk to go for it. If you don’t try, you don’t know. I tried and I achieved it – so I’m very happy for the team. It’s very special for me. I will always try to go for more and fight to the end to give everything I have.”

Under glorious sunshine that has proved something an anomaly over the past fortnight, the stage featuring the most climbing in this year’s Giro started with a flat opening section that hugged the shores of Lake Garda – holding back the whopping 5,200m of vertical ascent to the last 130km.

As the riders dipped in and out of the 21 tunnels overlooking the glistening waters of the lake, the peloton split in two on one occasion as the average pace went above 51kmph during a frantic opening half hour. After a few false starts, the day’s breakaway formed under the initiative of the ubiquitous Derek Gee (Israel-PremierTech).

The Canadian debutant – runner-up on three occasions so far – zipped clear in a move of 17 riders that also included the Irish Stage 8 winner Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost), the Paret-Peintre brothers – Aurelien and Valentin of AG2R Citroen – and the maglia ciclamino of Jonathan Milan (Bahrain Victorious).

Amid the uncertainty behind, nine riders danced clear of the pack and featured another GC outsider in Austrian Patrick Konrad and his Bora-Hansgrohe team-mate Cesare Benedetti, the local rider. The two groups came together on the first of five climbs – with the 26-man move holding a four-minute lead as they started the Passo Santa Barbara.

Healy took maximum points over the top of the Cat.1 climb to soar in move that would see him take over the blue jersey at the end of the day - despite the Irishman being thwarted by Davide Gabburo (Green Project-Bardiani) over the next two ascents.

Milan’s persistence on the climbs was rewarded when he won the intermediate sprint at Rovereto to consolidate his grip on the maglia ciclamino before dropping back to the peloton. An Astana-Qazaqstan duo of Christian Scaroni and Vadim Pronskiy then came to the fore to open up a sizeable gap over the break.

As the occasional shower added an additional curveball to proceedings, the growing gap saw Aurelien Paret-Peintre into the virtual pink jersey. The Frenchman featured in a chase group alongside his brother Valentin that formed on the penultimate climb of the day. Konrad, Healy, Gee, Carlos Verona (Movistar), Jack Haig (Bahrain Victorious), Diego Ulissi (UAE Team Emirates), Ben Swift (Ineos Grenadiers) and Filipo Zana (Jayco-AlUla) also featured as the Astana duo were swept up before the summit.

Without any team-mates in the break, Roglic’s Jumbo Visma team led the chase in the main pack behind as the lead was whittled down to under a minute ahead of the decisive ascent of Monte Bondone. By the time Rohan Dennis peeled off after a titanic shift, Armirail was still in the mix and defending his pink jersey with panache – although clearly on the rivet.

With 10km remaining both Armirail and his team-mate Thibaut Pinot were dropped, with Almeida’s UAE army taking things up to nullify the remnants of the breakaway. One man – the Italian champion Zana – held on in a six-man lead group to offer support to his team-mate Dunbar.

But once Zana faded and Dunbar dropped to the back, Almeida put in his decisive attack which saw him open up a small gap. Thomas was able to ride over but Roglic – being paced by his American team-mate Kuss – could not respond. The gap grew as the gradient eased in the final kilometres before Almeida – 12 years younger than his rival – got the better of Thomas to take a deserved win.

“It would have been nice to win the stage but I had to keep riding,” Thomas said. “I didn’t want to be caught playing cat and mouse with Joao with Roglic behind. So, we worked well together and then I led it out. Unfortunately, he had the jump on me and won the sprint. But it’s nice to be back in pink and gain some time. But it’s obviously not great to lose a team-mate [in Pavel Sivakov].”

Thomas said that it was “no surprise” to see Almeida – his closest challenger in the general classification – in such strong form entering the final week. “He was always one of the biggest rivals coming in here and he’s shown how strong he is – and his team as well.”

The Giro d’Italia continues on Wednesday with a GC interlude for the sprinters: a pan-flat 193km Stage 17 to Caorle and a chance for the sprinters ahead of back-to-back summit finishes and Saturday’s decisive mountain time trial.

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