Place Name: Via Roma
Address: Via Roma 66b, 42035 Castelnovo ne' Monti Reggio Emilia, Italy
Details: May 21, 2025
The riders leave the Province of Lucca from Viareggio for their trip North to Castelnovo ne’ Monti over the Alpe San Pellegrino, potentially the hardest climb of the entire Giro. The Alpe San Pellegrino comes after 80KM of racing and starts in Campori for 13.8KM at 8.8% but the last 3.5KM is over 11% average. A long descent to Ponte Dolo and an Intermediate Sprint in Cerredolo leads the race to the Toano climb which tops out 39KM from the finish. The Redbull Golden Kilometer sits atop Villa Minozzo 15KM later. After a short descent, the final climb of Pietra di Bismantova starts. It is 6KM long at 6% and ends 4.5KM from the finish with a gradually rolling road to the line in Castelnovo ne’ Monti. These types of finishes characterize this Giro and could make the time gaps between the favorites more narrow than in previous years that had more pure mountain top finishes.
The rain moved out from yesterday's ITT to make a clear and sunny start. Fabio Van den Bossche of Alpecin-Deceuninck, Owain Doull of EF-Education EasyPost, and Martin Marcellusi of VF-Group Bardiani CSF-Faizanè broke away after 6KM of racing but they would be brought back by a flurry of attacks. The race continued at over 53KM/HR average for the first hour but still no break had formed. Steven Kruijswijk of Visma-Lease a Bike and Xabier Azparren of Q36.5 led through the Intermediate Sprint in Borgo a Mozzano with the rest of the peloton nipping on their heels. They were finally caught with 136KM to go shortly after they passed the stunning Ponte Del Diavolo o Della Maddalena, a 13th century asymmetrical bridge spanning the Serchio River.
Wilco Kelderman of Visma-Lease a Bike and Wout Poels of XDS-Astana got away on an uncategorized climb with 120KM to go with the Alpe San Pellegrino looming in the distance. An enormous group of over 35 riders got away suddenly with 113KM to go and they joined up with Kelderman and Poels 5KM later, just 2KM before the climb started. UAE-XRG started riding in the peloton when the gap was just 1 minute and seemed to want to hold it there. Lorenzo Fortunato of XDS-Astana attacked the large break and with 5KM to climb, he had 35 seconds on around 15 riders remaining from the original break and 1 minute 30 seconds on the UAE-XRG led peloton which was significantly reduced in numbers.
Luke Plapp of Jayco AlUla attacked from the break with 4KM to climb. He was joined by Pello Bilbao of Bahrain Victorious, Nairo Quintana of Movistar, and Wout Poels with Marco Frigo of Israel-Premier Tech and Stefano Oldani of Cofidis chasing behind. Fortunato did an incredible ride to take the maximum points at the top, adding 40 points to his tally in the Mountains Classification. Quintana, Bilbao, Poels, and Plapp came over the top 55 seconds later but the peloton containing only the GC favorites of 20 riders were just 20 seconds further behind.
On the lower section of the descent with 80KM to go, the race started to settle and consolidate into groups. Fortunato was caught by the four chasers and the peloton slowed down and swelled with dropped riders making contact again. UAE-XRG continued to ride in the peloton and through the second Intermediate Sprint in Cerredolo, the gap had grown to 2 minutes 20 seconds. Fortunato led up and over the category 2 climb of Toano with an advantage of 2 minutes 45 seconds and increased hope that they may make it to the finish out front.
Lidl-Trek took over in the peloton at 36KM from the finish however and started a concerted chase. Q36.5 were up for it as well and added a man to the chase which started to bring down the gap. Quintana beat Fortunato to the line at the Redbull Golden Kilometer with 23KM to go in Villa Minozzo but their gap was halved from their maximum to just 1 minute 20 seconds. With 16KM to go, the gap was down to 1 minute with 16KM to go on the flat valley road running along side the Secchia River. The GC teams were lined up across the road but Ineos took over and lined it out with help from EF-Education EasyPost as they hit the start of the final climb of Pietra di Bismantova. In the break, Poels tried to accelerate but the bunch were right behind.
The catch was made with 9KM to go as Richard Carapaz of EF-Education EasyPost made a full blooded attack. No one immediately followed and the responsibility landed on UAE-XRG, who had numbers, to start a chase. A few attacks unsettled the favorites group and, even though there were enough helpers to set a pace, the speed dropped a bit as they looked around at each other. With 6KM to go and 1KM to climb, Carapaz had 33 seconds but UAE-XRG started riding harder once again with Rafal Majka. Carapaz went over the top maintaining his 30 second gap but it was down to 18 seconds under 1KM to go. The road raised to the finish but Carapaz had enough of a gap to briefly sit and celebrate the stage win by punching the air. The Maglia Rosa, Isaac del Toro of UAE-XRG led the favorites group in for second place 10 seconds behind Carapaz with Giulio Ciccone of Lidl-Trek sprinting for third.
Carapaz jumped over Brandon McNulty and Adam Yates to 6th overall, now 1 minute 56 seconds down on Isaac del Toro.
Tags: Giro d'Italia, 2025, Stage 11, May, Giro d'Italia 2025, Viareggio, Castelnovo ne’ Monti, Fabio Van den Bossche, Owain Doull, Martin Marcellusi, Steven Kruijswijk, Xabier Azparren, Wilco Kelderman, Wout Poels, Lorenzo Fortunato, Luke Plapp, Pello Bilbao, Nairo Quintana, Marco Frigo, Stefano Oldani, Richard Carapaz, Rafal Majka, Isaac del Toro, Giulio Ciccone