Nicolas Roche put in a late dig on stage 10 of the Giro d'Italia today, Tuesday; the ill effects of a crash last week clearly starting to ease for the Irish man.
As expected, the resumption of battle on stage 10 of the Giro d’Italia ended in a bunch sprint after 173km into Salsomaggiore today, Tuesday. But not anticipated was the sight of Nicolas Roche off the front on a day made for the sprinters.
The Irish Tinkoff-Saxo rider attacked on the first day of the race with any real climbs, but being instantly overhauled by Katusha in the last kilometre.
Since then a crash has taken him out of overall contention. But the effects of that spill are clearly wearing off as was evidenced by his move today on a short sharp climb just before the finish, with the sprinters’ team jostling for position.
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While he managed to get a gap, the lead-out men and the speed kings on their wheels could smell the finish line and so Roche’s effort came to nothing.
The stage was won Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ); his third victory of this race and one that shored up his lead in the points classification.
Roche finished in the main bunch of 79 riders on the same time as the winner, as did Philip Deignan of Team Sky.
Today’s stage was dominated by a two-man breakaway featuring Andrea Fedi (Neri Sottoli) and Marco Bandiera (Androni). And while they still had two minutes with 20km remaining, with just two of them out front they perhaps would have needed twice that to hold off the pack.
Both Deignan and Roche managed to stay clear of a late crash that married the finish.
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Roche’s directeur sportif, Lars Michaelson said it was good to see the Irish man having a go.
“It was a high pace finale with a short slope and a technical descent shortly before the finish and Nico had a decent go going up the ramp,” he said.
“Other than that, our goal was to keep (Rafal) Majka near the front and the guys delivered perfectly. Tomorrow, we’re headed out to do an interesting stage with a mountainous finale where we first of all have to keep Majka protected and out of trouble.”
For Deignan, today was a welcome non eventful day as he continues to try and ride himself into form after being sidelined early season by a broken collar bone.
He is hoping to be in a position to go on the attack in search of a stage win in the difficult final week of the race next week.
In his stickybottle Giro diary this morning he described a relaxed rest day in the Team Sky camp yesterday, when he managed to find time to check out the latest from the An Post Rás online.
And while he cautioned that he is not at his best, he is pleased with his condition considering he did so little racing before the Giro began in Belfast last Friday week.
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