Remembering Il Pirata & his bald boys, Giro 1998.
Tomorrow's stage 13 will end in the town of Cesenatico, hometown of Marco Pantani. And my guess another Italian rider will be motivated to secure another stage win. Finally, Italian national champ Pippo Pozzato's won a Giro stage. His first. After the shenanigans of stage 11 where riders' Vino, Basso, Cunego, Garzelli, Scarponi, Nbali were caught with their collective shorts down found a way to be in the break to succeed.
Vino seemed destined to fail as he sprinted to the line. It seemed he was in slow motion while a clever Pozzato in the streaking tricolore jersey brought back an Italian stage win in style. Thomas Voeckler almost threw a non-Italian wrench into the works with a very close second placing. This sprinters stage was supposed to go to the.... sprinters. But this cunning group surprised the peloton and favorite Tyler Farrar. The Garmin freight train rallied to force the pace to bridge the gap but came up short ten seconds behind the Pozzato break.
Classy win waving the tricolore!
Pippo's stage 12 tricolore smile!
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