Saturday, May 06, 2006

Giro starts on Saturday

Yeah, we need a little work to get the cobwebs out.

You stole my tunder on Savoldelli, but I'll get to it. Let's review the opening stage/prologue with a quote I lifted from velonews.com

"Basso could beat the pure climbers by 10-40 seconds in the opening 6.2km time trial at Seraing."

Results:
1) Paolo Savodelli (7:50)
2) Brad McGee (+0:11)
13) Ivan Basso (+0:23)
15) Damiano Cunego (+0:25)

Woops!

Savoldelli gets no respect for a defending champ and 2-time winner. Basso is probably a better Grand Tour athlete now, though Savoldelli's hardware is superior to Basso's. But Savoldelli has another advantage. His team is making his defense of the Giro the central event of the season. Basso, I think, has doubt about what his big event is--does he make the Giro or the Tour the higest priority?
Just how serious is Discovery Channel? Savoldelli's supporting cast includes Beltran, Ekimov, Rubiera, Padernos, plus Tom Danilson. This team is there to dominate the race as though it's Lance Armstong riding the Tour all over again. And I don't think they're at all enthused about the advent of Basso's dominance.

So, experts expected Basso to take an advantage today, but it was Savoldelli picking up 20 seconds cushion on all the climbers. Wow. That's pretty amazing. It was only an 8 minute race and he beat Basso by 23 seconds! Even after reading that I don't think Savoldelli is that much better than his competition.

OK, that was only 6.2 km of racing, so let's not read too much into it. We'll have a few days on the flats in Belgium before a Team Time Trial in Stage 5. Check out the rest of the schedule, though. Six of the last 8 stages are in the mountains. Buckle up for a wild finish.


Friday, May 05, 2006

Giro Starts on Sunday

OK, we're back after hiatus. I can't really say I have some big Giro prediction like we normally do for the TdF, mainly because I use the Giro to form some opinions on my TdF picks. Right now, we've just had some one-day classics and some meaningless tours. So it's hard to say who is the man right now.

But, since it's the Giro, you know an Italian is gonna win. And the early hype is for Cunego and Basso, begging the question: didn't Salvodeli win this thing last year? What is he? Chopped liver?

Considering that Basso has got to be thinking this is the year he can win yellow, my first instinct is that he lays up a bit in the Giro. Only then I remember these things:

1. Basso rode the Giro insanely tough even with illness last year.
2. When was the last time anyone pulled off the double?
3. Basso is fucking awesome.

So I'll go out on that huge limb and pick Basso to win this thing. The Grand Tours are back!
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