photo credits @ Giro d’Italia
Today’s wild finale saw Olav Kooij (Visma-Lease a Bike) snatch the victory in stage 9 at the Giro d’Italia, denying both Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) and Jhonatan Narvaez (Ineos Grenadiers) another win.
After attacking late on the final climb, Narvaez arrived in the center of Naples with 12 seconds over the peloton, later passing under the flamme rouge with no one in close pursuit.
However, despite looking poised for victory, the sprinters aided by a sensational pull from race leader Tadej Pogacar surged back into contention, with Kooij emerging victorious to take the first Grand Tour victory of his career.
Meanwhile, Pogacar now holds a 2’40” lead over Dani Martinez (Bora-Hansgrohe) in the general classification ahead of tomorrow’s first rest day, with Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) recovering from a crash to stay in third at 2’58” back.
Race Highlights
Team Polit Kometa’s Andrea Pietrobon and Mirco Maestri marked the day’s first breakaway effort, with the duo riding clear soon after the start, later building up an advantage of over three minutes after 60km of racing.
With 58km to go, Thomas and his Ineos Grenadiers teammate Tobias Foss, along with Maxi Schachmann (Bora-Hansgrohe), were involved in a crash. But, the three riders were able to quickly remount and rejoin the peloton.
Back up front, the escapees were still holding onto a gap of around a minute with 40km remaining, with Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal Quick-Step) and Nicola Conci Bayer (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Lewis Askey (Groupama-FDJ) and Kevin Vermaerke bridging their way to them some 13km later.
Ewen Costiou (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) was the next rider to make his way to the leaders with 23km to go, with Alaphilippe attacking just 3km later.
With 9.5km still to go, Alaphilippe had opened up his lead by 13 seconds along on the uncategorized climb of Posillipo. But, the Frenchman was later reeled in just 2km later.
With the field back together, Narvaez attacked with 3km remaining. Yet, despite opening up a margin of around 12 seconds, a huge effort by Pogacar reconstituted the bunch, with Kooij edging out Milan for the stage win.
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