Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers) used his time trial skills talents to win the stage 2 time of the Giro d’Italia around Tirana, as Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) produced the ride of the day to finish a close second and so snatch the maglia rosa from stage 1 winner Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek). Wout Van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) endured a bad day and so failed to get even close to Pedersen.
21-year-old Tarling set a time of 16:07 for the 13.7km city centre course, at an average speed of 51.003km/h. Tarling dived through the many corners with control, powered up the gradual climb to Sauk and then took a few risks and stayed aero on the fast descent to the finish line.
Roglič matched Tarling’s time checks and fought a rising head wind in the final kilometre to finish just one second slower.
Mathias Vacek (Lidl-Trek) was third on the stage at five seconds, with US national time trial champion Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) fourth at 12 seconds.
Roglič took the pink jersey and gained time on all his GC rivals. Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) lost 16 seconds to the veteran Slovenian, Michael Storer (Tudor Pro Racing) lost 27 seconds and Canada’s Derek Gee (Israel-Premier Tech) 28 seconds.
Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) shipped 25 seconds to Roglič, Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek) lost a significantly more 42 seconds, while Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) lost 48 seconds. Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) risked crashing on mid-course corner but fought on to lose 37 seconds to Roglič.
Pedersen started last in the maglia rosa, in a virtual pursuit match with Van Aert and Roglič for the new maglia rosa. Van Aert soon faded but Pedersen refused to give up hope of staying in pink. At the line Pedersen was timed at just 12 seconds down on Roglič but that two second much and so he lost the maglia rosa.
More to come….
Results
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