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Giro d'Italia Stage 20: Richard Carapaz cracks as Jai Hindley moves into race leadJai Hindley on 2022 Giro d'Italia Stage 20 (picture credit LaPresse)

Giro d'Italia Stage 20: Richard Carapaz cracks as Jai Hindley moves into race lead

Overall battle finally explodes into life in the Dolomites, Alessandro Covi of UAE Team Emirates wins the stage
by Simon_MacMichael
Sat, May 28, 2022 16:22
5

Jai Hindley of Bora Hansgrohe is poised to become the first Australian to win the Giro d'Italia after 2019 champion Richard Carapaz of Ineos Grenadiers, who held a three-second advantage this morning, cracked on the final climb of the 105st edition of the race.

Today's stage, with three big climbs in the Dolomites including a summit finish on the Passo Fedaia, was won with a fine solo attack from the break by Alessandro Covi of UAE Team Emirates.

With just tomorrow's closing time trial in Verona to come, Hindley, who has never gone quicker against the clock when in the same race as Carapaz, needed to build an advantage over the Ecuadorian, and in the end it was a commanding one, as he finished around a minute and a half ahead of his rival.

It should be enough to ensure that the 26 year old from Perth will be on the top step of the podium in the famous Roman arena in Verona when the race comes to a close tomorrow.

More to follow

Giro d'Italia 2022
Jai Hindley
Richard Carapaz
Simon MacMichael

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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5 comments

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mdavidford | 2 years ago
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Quote:

the 105st edition of the race

When did they introduce weight classifications?

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ErnieC | 2 years ago
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Well done Jai Hindley and all the best for the next stage. 

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Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
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I like Carapaz but can't help feeling that he and Ineos have reaped what they've sown in terms of their conservative strategy throughout the race, if you balance on that knife edge of doing just enough it only takes one thing to upset the applecart, and today there were two, Porte having to drop out and Hindley being on a really good day. Hindley's a very deserving winner (assuming all goes well) but a little more ambition in strategy could have given RC a much better chance.

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Simon E replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
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Rendel Harris wrote:

I like Carapaz but can't help feeling that he and Ineos have reaped what they've sown in terms of their conservative strategy throughout the race

Lanterne Rouge podast said this tonight, and compared Ineos with Jumbo-Visma's defensive strategy in the 2020 Tour, while Daniel Friebe has repeatedly bemoaned the lack of GC action in the Cycling Podcast.

For a while I thought Daniel was being a bit unfair - riders can't race like that for 3 weeks, as Simon Yates showed - but he has a point. It appears that riders are so evenly matched that no-one can afford to go too deep too often because it comes back to bite them eventually (and this Giro is again back-loaded with several really hard stages).

Even if Carapaz can recover from today physically I can't see Hindley losing 1½ minutes in 17km. But it's never over until it's over...

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Rendel Harris replied to Simon E | 2 years ago
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Simon E wrote:

It appears that riders are so evenly matched that no-one can afford to go too deep too often because it comes back to bite them eventually (and this Giro is again back-loaded with several really hard stages).

I think organisers are going to have to think about their routes if they want to see racing; the Giro and the Vuelta seem at times to be in a sort of arms race to see who can create the nastiest, hardest stages and this often encourages negative racing, nobody dares to go hard for the fear that they will explode because of the difficulty of the climbs, to be honest although the scenery has been magnificent as ever it's been one of the most boring GTs I can remember for a while, day after day of the GC contenders happy to let breakaways go and riding tempo together with nobody even attempting to attack until the last couple of kilometres. When MVDP was doing his exhibitions (one of the few bits of real "proper" racing) one of the commentators on Eurosport questioned why he was putting so much out there and another replied, "Maybe he's just bored." I think maybe a longer harder time trial early in the race – maybe one on Etna? - would have helped to create bigger gaps in the GC and so forced more attacking riding.

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