A mass crash marred the closing kilometres of stage 2 of the Giro d’Italia, with dozens of riders held up by the fall which partially blocked the route. Jay Vine (UAE Team Emirates) and Tao Geoghegan Hart (Ineos Grenadiers) were among the GC riders who lost 19 seconds in the finale in San Salvo.
Jack Haig (Bahrain Victorious), Patrick Konrad (Bora-Hansgrohe), Eddie Dunbar (Jayco-AlUla) and Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), as well as the EF Education-EasyPost trio of Hugh Carthy, Ben Healy and Rigoberto Urán of EF Education-EasyPost also lost the same amount after being caught behind the crash.
Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates) avoided the crash and worked for teammate Pascal Ackermann in the finale, but he lost 12 seconds after the commissaires decreed a split had opened in the front group.
Some 30 riders were able to steer around the crash, with Italian sprinter Jonathan Milan (Bahrain Victorious) claiming the host nation’s first win of the 2023 race.
Mark Cavendish (Astana-Qazaqstan) lost out on his hopes of contesting stage victory when he slid to the ground while slowing down in the aftermath of the crash ahead of him.
The crash seemingly was caused when two riders tangled in the centre of the pack and then rippled out to the right side of the peloton, on a section of straight road in a fast, flat finale.
The crash took place some 800 metres before the 3km to go banner, inside which riders are automatically awarded the same time if caught up in a crash or puncturing.
“It was caused when the road narrowed,” race commentator and former Giro d’Italia winner Stefano Garzelli told Italian television.
Various Trek-Segafredo riders were amongst those caught up in the fall, with Daan Hoole appearing to be the worst affected, though the Dutchman was able to remount and complete the stage. Other fallers included Movistar lead-out man Max Kanter and Martin Tusveld (Team DSM).
Although race leader Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) and arch-rival Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) were not affected by the crash, a number of other GC contenders were caught behind, most notably Geoghegan Hart.
The 2020 Giro winner was among the best performers in Saturday’s opening time trial, but he drops four places to 8th overall, 59 seconds behind Evenepoel. Vine is now 10th overall at 1:05, but UAE Team Emirates directeur sportif Fabio Baldato confirmed to Cyclingnews that the Australian had not been a faller in the crash.
Another overall contender, Aleksandr Vlasov (Bora-Hansgrohe), pulled off a successful salvage operation after he was caught behind the crash. Helped by his teammate Nico Denz, Vlasov managed to chase back up to finish in the front group, and the Russian climbs three places to 7th overall, still 55 seconds off Evenepoel’s maglia rosa.
“At first Alex was caught behind the crash, but Nico Denz brought him back up to Remco’s group, so the lads did very well,” directeur sportif Enrico Gasparotto told Cyclingnews. “None of our guys fell, they’re all unscathed.”
Although the course narrowed just before the point of the crash, Gasparotto pointed out that the barriers had been put in place in order to fence off a series of bollards.
“All the teams were organised in front because we’d all had cars driving ahead to do the recon, so everybody had the information,” Gasparotto said. “I’ve done 10 Giri as a rider myself, and the first 10 days are always stressful, with crashes. It’s part of the game, and it was probably better to have the barriers there and avoid the guys riding through those bollards at 60 kph.”
