Giro d’Italia stage 14 LIVE: A key GC day crowned by a tough summit finish

Visma-Lease a Bike controlling the peloton on the climb.

Having managed to keep all their roster together on the climb, Visma are now going quickly down the descent. Vingegaard has already been vocal about his desire to win this stage, and they’re giving this breakaway no leeway, bringing their lead down to about 1:30.

Van der Lee and Christen have been caught by the rest of the breakaway again.

Behind Ciccone, Rubio, Arrieta, Cepeda, Donovan and Jensen were the next riders to the top of the climb, all claiming KOM points.

There’s not exactly a sprint in the chase group behind for the remaining point, but Ciccone came through to ensure he was third.

Rubio, Ciccone and Cepeda have gone clear from the rest of the chasers.

Christen and Van der Lee are just 500m from the summit.

Rubio’s upped the pace in the chase group, with lots of his Movistar teammates, including as, in toe.

Christen and Van der Lee, leading the race.

Visma still have their full contingent of seven riders (minus Kelderman, who abandoned earlier in the race) at the front of the peloton.

With so many summit to be crested and therefore points to be won, this is a huge day in the KOM classification. Even riders yet to score a point can come into contention for the blue jersey, and some of those who have gotten into the break will have that in mind. We’ll know who come the top of this first climb, when we’ll see who sprints for the points.

There are over 20 riders back in the chase group, featuring many strong climbers – Mas, Poels, Vlasov, Rubio, Ciccone, Cepeda. Plus Hirt and De La Cruz, who are the highest ranked riders on GC at 7:53 and 6:43 respectively.

Van der Lee and Christen are 20 seconds ahead of the chase group

Seven more riders have joined the Ciccone group from behind.

Ciccone has four riders with him as he pursues the two leaders.

Back in the peloton, Storer has just made it back to the back of the group.

Ciccone is trying to chase after them. If he’s after KOM points, he’ll want to catch them before the top.

Christen has clipped off the front of the breakaway, and gone clear with Van der Lee.

A glimpse of the breakaway that’s managed to get up the road for now.

Flat tyre for Storer, the man who’s seventh on GC. He’s going to have to use up some precious energry to return to the peloton.

Movistar appear to be the best represented team in the break, with at least 20 riders.

It’s back up again now in the break as Leknessund takes over.

The pace has been knocked off in the peloton, no one team wants to control it.

Visma look content enough. They have all 7 of their riders together at the front of the peloton, and keeping the break at just 10 seconds.

The break is being stretched out as the EF riders in it up the pace.

At the other end of the break, the Grupetto is forming, full of all the suspected sprinters, plus, Scaroni, now a long way down from the GC top ten.

Mas, Poels, Arrieta, Cepeda are also all the break.

Some of the most eye-catching names in this group – Ciccone, Vlasov and Narváez.

The chasers have joined the three out front, to form one huge new lead group.

Visma continue to ride tempo at the front of the peloton a these moves go clear.

That chase group has swollen to about 20 riders.

Now more attacks come out the peloton as they start the climb. A group of about 12 are chasing the 3 leaders.

Those two join Bais as they reach the official start of the climb. They will spend the next 16km climbing at an average gradient of 6%.

Marcellusi is the Bardiani rider, and Hamilton the Picnic rider.

A Picnic and Bardiani rider are trying to join Bais.

As the road goes uphill already towards the official start of the climb, Bais attacks.

A Bardiani rider tried attacking at the flag, but was brought back as Visma-Lease a Bike take control of the peloton and set the tempo.

There will only be two kilometres until the start of the day’s first climb, the category one Saint-Barthélémy.

One factor that will come into play today is the heat. Like yesterday, it’s a bit of a scorcher out there, but this time any GC rider who struggles to find their best legs in the hot temperatures is in danger of losing time.

Afonso Eulálio at the start wearing pink – for one last time?

The riders are on the move in the neutralised start – one of the few parts of today’s parcours that is flat.

Vingegaard has been candid about his intentions of taking the pink jersey today, but they can be sure that Afonso Eulálio will fight to the very end to keep it. The young Portuguese rider has defied expectations to keep it for this long, but 33 seconds feels like a very slender margin on a stage as tough as this up against the climber as good as Vingegaard.

All this climbing means that at the GC which, which has been on a hold this week aside from the one time trial, will reignite, with all the riders up there in and around the top ten jostling for position.

For the first time since the very end of the second week, when Jonas Vingegaard climbed to victory at Corno alle Scale, the Giro is in the mountains. The riders must take on no less than five climbs, two of them ranked category one, including a huge 16km slog up to the finish at Pila.

Current reports on the ground are that the weather is dry and very warm for today’s major stage.

Hello and welcome to the live coverage of stage 14 of the Giro d’Italia. It’s set to be a seriously important day for the GC riders in some dauntingly tough climbs in the Italian Alps.