Giro d’Italia 2014: Stage 2 Preview

Stage 2: Belfast > Belfast – 219 km

Heavy favorites Orica-GreenEdge probably didn’t need much help on Day 1, but they got it anyway, starting early enough to avoid some pouring rain. Their time withstood spirited efforts from Team BMC and Omega Pharma-Quick Step, putting Svein Tuft into the pink jersey for Stage 2. Movistar turned in a disappointing performance in the wet weather that left Nairo Quintana almost a minute back on rivals Rigoberto Uran and Cadel Evans. Uran and Evans have even bigger gap (about a minute and a half) on Joaquim Rodriguez, whose Katusha squad had a rough day. But by far the biggest story of Stage 1 was the nasty crash that took down Garmin-Sharp’s Daniel Martin and three other riders. Martin lost control on what appeared to be a rainslicked manhole cover, and went down very hard, breaking his collarbone and ultimately abandoning the race. After a heartbreaking crash ended his hope of winning Liege-Bastogne-Liege, Martin’s fortunes in 2014 have turned even worse. The would-be GC contender (and member of the VH pre-race Top 10) saw the biggest goal of his season slip away in the blink of an eye. Teammate Ryder Hesjedal was not one of those who crashed, but the squad had already dropped one of their members earlier in the course, and as team time trials are judged according to the performance of the fifth best rider, Hesjedal and the others who survived the incident were forced to stop and wait for Fabian Wegmann to catch back up and bring their number to five before they could continue. Rolling across the line in last place and almost three and a half minutes down, Hesjedal’s GC hopes are already dashed as well.

After an eventful opening chrono, road racing begins in earnest Saturday morning. Stage 2 also begins and ends in Belfast. It’s a 219 kilometer loop with only a pair of Category 4 climbs to challenge the peloton. The profile won’t provide many opportunities for riders to get away, and this early in the race, GC teams will look to marshal breakaways quickly. However, the first sprint stage of a Grand Tour is always a hectic affair, and the jockeying for position will be aggressive. Furthermore, it could rain, and winds will be high on the coastal roads. Today’s conditions proved perilous, and not just for Garmin; no one else got into any serious incidents but a number of other teams had riders slipping and sliding around the corners. With a high intensity sprint stage on tap for tomorrow, things could get hairy. It will no doubt be a nervous journey from start to finish.

Should everyone manage to stay upright, this stage is very likely to end in a bunch sprint. Without many obstacles to slow him down, Marcel Kittel is the heavy favorite. Kittel was the best sprinter at last year’s Tour de France; in this Giro, without either of the sport’s other two top fast men, the gap to the next best sprinter is significant. He also benefits from a team completely committed to his cause—and GSH knows how to set their sprinters up for victory. In the event that Kittel does somehow get dropped before the final kilometers, Luka Mezgec is an attractive second option, on nice form this year.

The two men with the best chance to take on the GSH juggernaut will be Cannondale’s Elia Viviani and FDJ’s Nacer Bouhanni. Viviani is coming off a Tour of Turkey in which he beat Mark Cavendish in two stages, so it will be interesting to see him matched up against another of the top finishers in the game. Bouhanni has already collected several wins this season, but most of them have come against lower level fields. We’ll see how he does against Grand Tour competition.

Michael Matthews will hope to be the next pink jersey wearer for Orica-GreenEdge. Prognosticators often focus on his versatility, but don’t forget that he really does have the top end speed to be in the mix on a sprint stage. The also versatile Ben Swift of Team Sky looks very sharp this year. On the other hand, it’s always a possibility that Sky will go with Edvald Boasson Hagen, also speedy. Trek’s Giacomo Nizzolo seems to be back on form after his collarbone injury, and he has a nice team around him as well. Alessandro Petacchi rides for an OPQS outfit that knows how to handle the crosswinds. Should the conditions shake up the state of affairs on the stage, Petacchi could be a dangerous contender, and coming off a strong TTT, there is a slight chance that he could find himself in the pink jersey if he is among those benefitting from bonus seconds on the day. Garmin-Sharp will be shifting their focus to stage wins now that Martin and Hesjedal are out of contention for the pink: Tyler Farrar looks much improved this season.

Unless the rough conditions cause some sort of major shakeup, it’s hard to see anyone beating Kittel on the day, and really hard to see anyone other than the above names pulling off that surprise, but for further outsiders, look to AG2R’s Davide Appollonio, Neri Sottoli’s Francesco Chicchi, and Tinkoff-Saxo’s Manuel Belletti.

VeloHuman Stage Favorites

1. Marcel Kittel | 2. Elia Viviani | 3. Nacer Bouhanni

Be sure follow @VeloHuman on Twitter for more analysis during the race! The preview of Stage 3 will be up soon after the conclusion of Stage 2, so stay tuned. If you missed it, the overall race preview can be found here.