Giro Italia Stage 17: Ulissi awarded stage win after Visconti relegated to third for pushing

Giovanni Visconti of Farnese Vini-ISD Neri crossed the line first in today's Stage 17 of the Giro d'Italia in Tirano, but was relegated to third place after twice pushing Diego Ulissi of Lampre-ISD in the closing metres to try and make room along the barriers. Ulissi gets the win, with the third rider contesting the sprint, Movistar's Pablo Lastras, moving up to second. The trio were the final survivors of a 16-man breakaway group that had been out for most of the 230km stage that started in Feltre. Alberto Contador retains the race lead on a day when there was no change at the top of the overall standings.

The Farnese Vini rider can count himself lucky that he wasn’t disqualified altogether, with Ulissi nearly losing control of his bike metres from the line, and certainly it’s hard to say that his actions were any less dangerous than those of HTC-Highroad’s Mark Renshaw when he was thrown out of last year’s Tour de France for headbutting Garmin’s Julian Dean during a sprint finish.

Visconti, riding in the tricolore jersey as Italian national road race champion, had signalled his intention to go on the attack on today’s stage and proved good to his word, getting into a 16-strong break that besides Ulissi and Lastras included Jan Bakelants of Omega Pharma-Lotto, Christophe Le Mevel of Garmin-Cervelo and Kanstantsin Sivstov of HTC Highroad.

The latter was the highest placed escapee in the general classification, lying 12th this morning, but at 12 minutes 5 seconds down on Contador he presented a minimal threat to the maglia rosa. Although he didn't contest the stage win, his efforts today were rewarded by his moving up to fifth place overall.

Going up the day’s final climb, the Aprica, a number of riders tried to launch attacks off that breakaway group, including AG2R’s Hubert Dupont who had managed to bridge across, but with a number of riders clearly having their eyes on the stage win, gaps were quickly closed down and the Frenchman was one of several riders shelled out of the back as Visconti led Lastras over the summit.

As the remnants of the front group hit the flat roads of Valtellina at the bottom of the descent some 7km out, eight riders from the break remained in contention, and by now it was clear they weren’t going to be caught, with the main group three minutes behind them. Just four men remained in contention going under the kilometre to go banner, the trio who contested the controversial sprint, and Bakelants, who fell away with 700 metres still to ride.

Another rider who had promised to pull out something special today was Vincenzo Nibali, placed third overall, who had demonstrated on Sunday that he is the best descender in this year’s race.

Today’s stage profile featured long descents within the final 64km after the climbs of the Passo del Tonale then the Aprica, the latter crested 19km out, giving the Sicilian an opportunity to try and take time back from Michele Scarponi, who had started the day 47 seconds behind him in the general classification this morning.

Liquigas-Cannondale worked tirelessly at the front of the bunch to keep the breakaway in check and maintain the pace ahead of Nibali’s expected attack, with Scarponi, wearing the red points jersey – a classification actually led by a long way by Contador – tucked in right behind them.

As it turned out, Nibali’s promised move never materialised, Scarponi sticking to him like glue all the way down the Aprica, and the Lampre-ISD man remains second overall behind Contador going into tomorrow’s 151km medium mountain stage from Morbegno to San Pellegrino Terme.

Giro d’Italia Stage 17 Result 
1  ULISSI Diego           Lampre-ISD                 5:31:51
2  LASTRAS Pablo          Movistar                      0:00
3  VISCONTI Giovanni      Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli     0:00
4  BAKELANDTS Jan         Omega Pharma-Lotto            0:04
5  TABORRE Fabio          Acqua & Sapone                0:08
6  VORGANOV Eduard        Katusha                       0:08
7  DUPONT Hubert          AG2R                          0:08
8  HERNANDEZ Jesus        Saxo Bank-SunGard             0:08
9  KISERLOVSKI Robert     Astana                        0:08
10 SIVTSOV Kanstantsin    HTC-Highroad                  0:10
11 FRANK Mathias          BMC Racing                    0:40
12 GASTAUER Ben
           AG2R                          2:10
13 LOSADA Alberto         Katusha                       2:10
14 LE MEVEL Christophe    Garmin-Cervelo                2:36
15 MAZZANTI Luca          Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli     2:59
16 LANG Sebastian
         Omega Pharma-Lotto            2:59
17 CARRARA Matteo
         Vacansoleil-DCM               2:59
18 RABOTTINI Matteo       Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli     2:59
19 RUJANO Jose            Androni Giocattoli            2:59
20 SELVAGGI Mirko
         Vacansoleil-DCM               2:59

Giro d’Italia Overall Standings after Stage 17 
1  CONTADOR Alberto       Saxo Bank-SunGard         68:18:27
2  SCARPONI Michele       Lampre-ISD                    4:58
3  NIBALI Vincenzo        Liquigas-Cannondale           5:45
4  GADRET John            AG2R                          7:35
5  SIVTSOV Kanstantsin    HTC-Highroad                  9:12
6  RUJANO Jose            Androni Giocattoli            9:18
7  NIEVE Mikel            Euskadi-Euskaltel             9:22
8  MENCHOV Denis          Geox-TMC                      9:38
9  KREUZIGER Roman        Astana                        9:47
10 RODRIGUEZ Joaquin      Katusha                      10:25