Chris Froome (Team Sky) esealed victory in the Giro d’Italia on Saturday by holding Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) in check up the final climb of the race.
The four-time Tour de France champion takes a 40-second lead over Tom Dumoulin into Sunday’s mostly ceremonial finish in Rome and is poised to win his third consecutive Grand Tour, matching the achievements of cycling greats Eddy Merckx and Bernard Hinault.
Dumoulin attacked Froome multiple times on the finishing climb of the 214-kilometer leg from Susa to Cervinia but in five attempts wasn’t able to gain any ground. After Dumoulin’s fifth attack, Froome responded with an acceleration of his own and dropped Dumoulin briefly.
Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott) won the stage with a long, solo breakaway to celebrate his 34th birthday.
The concluding stage is a flat 115-kilometer leg of 10 laps around a circuit through the center of Rome.
“Obviously there were attacks that I had to follow in the finale but I felt very much in control and very capable of following today,” said Froome. “I think everyone had such a hard day yesterday that I think nobody really had the extra legs to go anywhere.”
“This Giro has been brutal, absolutely brutal,” he added. “When someone tends to have a bad here it’s not just a matter of 30 seconds or one minute, it’s 10, 15 minutes. It’s a brutal race.”
Giro d’Italia 2018 – stage 20 results (Susa – Cervinia):
| 1 | Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott) | 5:43:48 |
| 2 | Robert Gesink (LottoNL-Jumbo) | +02’16” |
| 3 | Felix Grossschartner (Bora-hansgrohe) | +02’41” |
| 4 | Giulio Ciccone (Bardiani-CSF) | +03’45” |
| 5 | Gianluca Brambilla (Trek-Segafredo) | +05’22” |
| 6 | Wout Poels (Team Sky) | +06’03” |
| 7 | Chris Froome (Team Sky) | ,, |
| 8 | Davide Formolo (Bora-hansgrohe) | ,, |
| 9 | Domenico Pozzovivo (Bahrain-Merida) | ,, |
| 10 | Richard Carapaz (Movistar) | ,, |
| 11 | Sam Oomen (Team Sunweb) | ,, |
| 12 | Miguel Angel Lopez (Astana) | ,, |
| 13 | Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) | +06’09” |
| 14 | George Bennett (LottoNL-Jumbo) | +06’45” |
| 15 | Patrick Konrad (Bora-hansgrohe) | ,, |
| 16 | Pello Bilbao (Astana) | ,, |
| 17 | Alexandre Geniez (AG2R La Mondiale) | +07’04” |
| 18 | Carlos Betancur (Movistar) | ,, |
| 19 | Hubert Dupont (AG2R La Mondiale) | +08’54” |
| 20 | Sergio Henao (Team Sky) | +09’42” |
General classification after stage 20:
| 1 | Chris Froome (Team Sky) | 86:11:50 |
| 2 | Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) | +46” |
| 3 | Miguel Angel Lopez (Astana) | +04’57” |
| 4 | Richard Carapaz (Movistar) | +05’44” |
| 5 | Domenico Pozzovivo (Bahrain-Merida) | +08’03” |
| 6 | Pello Bilbao (Astana) | +11’50” |
| 7 | Patrick Konrad (Bora-hansgrohe) | +13’01” |
| 8 | George Bennett (LottoNL-Jumbo) | +13’17” |
| 9 | Sam Oomen (Team Sunweb) | +14’18” |
| 10 | Davide Formolo (Bora-hansgrohe) | +15’16” |
| 11 | Alexandre Geniez (AG2R La Mondiale) | +17’30” |
| 12 | Wout Poels (Team Sky) | +17’40” |
| 13 | Sergio Henao (Team Sky) | +29’41” |
| 14 | Jose Goncalves (Katusha-Alpecin) | +34’29” |
| 15 | Carlos Betancur (Movistar) | +41’48” |
| 16 | Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) | +43’46” |
| 17 | Rohan Dennis (BMC) | +56’07” |
| 18 | Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott) | +58’16” |
| 19 | Gianluca Brambilla (Trek-Segafredo) | +1h00’30” |
| 20 | Michael Woods (EF Education First-Drapac) | +1h01’24” |
