With one week to go in the first Grand Tour of the 2018 season, it looks like it’s going to be a two-horse race with an outsider looking in with a mathematical and physiological chance of winning. Why physiological? I’ll explain later.
For the first time, a Grand Tour had its grand depart outside of Europe. Amid fears of terrorism, the organizers of the Giro decided to start in Israel, holding three stages there. Why? Well, I think the main reason is money and second, which I think is the right one is that for the first time, there is an Israeli-registered professional cycling team, called as the, “Israeli Cycling Academy.”
Of course, nothing untoward happened during the Giro. Lance Armstrong was even there, offering his brand of insight for the first three stages, that a 7-time, disgraced but still defiant Tour champion can only dish out.
And how about the race? The 2018 Giro consists of 21 stages (tonight is stage 15) with a distance of 3,576 kilometers. There are eight mountain stages, five sprinters stages, six hilly stages, two individual time trials and three rest days. The defending champion is 27 year sold Tom Dumoulin, 6ft1in and 157lb. Skinny you might say but considered a “giant” in the peloton. At this point, the Dutchman is sitting second place, 1.24min behind the surprising overall leader Simon Yates of Great Britain. Yates, at 5ft8in, 128lbs, is two years younger than Dumoulin. You can now appreciate the difference between the two protagonist in terms of anatomy.
In other words, Dumoulin doesn’t excel when there roads starts to tilt upwards because of his “hulking” physique while Yates, the diminutive one, is an exceptional climber. Dumoulin, instead is an exceptional time triallist, in the same mold as the Miguel Indurains and the Jan Ullrichs of the world, giants who are TT specialist who can climb. Dumoulin is the reigning World Champion in the ITT.
Slowly, Yates is gaining time on Dumoulin while the latter is waiting for this Tuesdays’ 32km ITT to overhaul Yates, Problem is that there are still two mountain stages after that. Yates says he needs 3min cushion this Tuesday, instead he has half of that. If Yates can keep his losses within 30-45 second, he’ll have good chance of winning this Giro.
What about Chris Froome? The “other” Brit, he’s sitting at 6th place, 3.10min behind Yates. While showing weakness during the first 13 stages, he suddenly exploded during the most difficult stage, the climb to Monte Zoncolan and dropped everyone to win it. You see, Froome is somebody you can’t count off. He may looked like an amateur today, but the next day, he may look like Bo Jackson in his prime- unstoppable! I think its in the physiology of Froome, that he can command his body to perform beyond its capability. It reminded me of one local rider I raced against (but I couldn’t beat him), Ricky Ermitanio, who on some days would win a race when he wasn’t the fittest. But his mind was so strong that he could command his body to do things beyond its capability that he would get sick after winning.
Maybe Froome is like that, and that’s why Dumoulin and Yates should not look beyond the 4-time Tour de France champion.