2015 Giro d'Italia Stage 20 Results & Recap
Stage 20 of the 2015 Giro d'Italia is in the books. The final results and standings are below, followed by our recap of how the race unfolded.
Race Recap
A spectacular final day’s mountain racing in the 2015 Giro d’Italia saw overall leader Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) retain the maglia rosa despite getting dropped by both his closest rivals, Fabio Aru (Astana Pro Team) and Mikel Landa on the second last ascent, the Colle delle Finestre, and losing well over two minutes by the finale.
Following Friday’s victory in Cervinia, Aru claimed his second straight mountain top win at Sestriere, soloing away 1.5 kilometres from the line from closest pursuer Rigoberto Uran (Etixx-Quick Step). Aru simultaneously consolidated his second place overall, whilst Mikel Landa (Astana ProTeam), having briefly ripped the Giro d’Italia apart on the Colle delle Finestre, finally settled for completing the podium in third.
Barring absolute disaster on Sunday, though, it was the rider who finished sixth at 2-25 on Aru, Contador, who arguably had most to celebrate. In terms of pure racing, stage 20’s Alpine trek was Contador’s hardest day on the bike in the entire 2015 Giro d’Italia - and yet his overall lead remained in place.
As a result, Contador is now just 24 hours away from winning what the record books state is his seventh Grand Tour victory - although, given two additional titles were lost because of his positive clenbuterol test, the 32-year-old still considers the 2015 Giro d’Italia to be his ninth.
Fortunately for Contador, a fast, well-surfaced descent of the Finestre did not see any further time gaps open, but with 16 kilometres of false flat then a steady rise to Sestriere left to tackle, and no team support in sight, any weakness in Contador would have been badly exposed.
Instead, on the comparatively much easier slopes the Spaniard gathered up his strength for one last major effort and - impressively - reduced the gap on Landa and Zakarin to just 50 seconds at one point. Though he had one Astana rider, Tanel Kangert, sitting on his back wheel by this point , tide began to turn back in Contador’s favour even further when the absence of a sustained collaboration between Zakarin and Landa saw their joint move begin to fizzle out.
With the Russian and the Spaniard joined by Aru, Hesjedal, Kruijswijk and Uran, the Astana attack gained fresh impetus. But if Landa had any dreams of upsetting the overall classification at the last possible moment, they were quickly quashed as he found himself working for Aru on the front of the string of six riders.
Two kilometres from the finish, even though Contador began to fade again, it was clear that no attacks would now dismantle the top three places overall. Instead it fell to Aru to break away, dropping first Hesjedal - finally second again on a stage, although his hugely impressive mountain riding in the last week means the Canadian has moved into the top five overall - and then Urán. A few moments later, a second stage for the young Italian was in the bag.
With four mountain top stage wins this week - two for Aru, two for Landa and a fifth thanks to Paolo Tiralongo in the first - as well as second and third overall as well as the Best Young Rider’s jersey, Astana’s crushing hold on the Giro d’Italia’s climbs has netted the Kazakh team rich rewards. Aru’s re-emergence, though, and the seemingly unstoppable rise of Mikel Landa, came too late for either to make more than dents in Contador’s armour.
\nWith the glorious benefit of hindsight, Contador missing Friday’s press conference at the finish will be taken by some as a sign of impending weakness. But the Spaniard explained at the finish that in fact his near-crisis came because he was paying the price for the daily wear and tear of what has been nearly three weeks of leading the Giro d’Italia.
\n“I’ve paid for the efforts of racing hard each day,” Contador, who took the overall lead as early as stage five and has worn the maglia rosa ever since barring one day, said. “But I knew that I had a good margin on Aru already. It was all about not panicking and concentrating on keeping things under control.”
Barring total disaster on Sunday’s flat stage from Turin to Milan, at the end of what has been a tumultuous race finally looms into sight, Contador’s first part of his bid Giro d’Italia-Tour de France double is therefore, all but in the bag. And his next target, wearing the maillot jaune in Paris, is already on his mind. As he said at the finish, “I will have a good supper tonight, but the build-up for the Tour starts here.”
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