Cycling: Fernando Gaviria (Quick-Step Floors) also won Stage 5 of the 100th Giro d'Italia. The Colombian prevailed against Jakub Mareczko (Wilier-Selle Italia) and Sam Bennett (Bora-hansgrohe) in an uncontrolled mass sprint in Messina. André Greipel (Lotto Soudal) sprinted to fourth place. The German has to cede his sprinter jersey to Gaviria. Fifth was Phil Bauhaus (Sunweb). As expected, there were no significant changes in the overall ranking. Luxembourg's Bob Jungels (Quick-Step Floors) remains in pink.
The Shark of Messina is coming home
Yesterday we got on the Stage 4 of the 100th Giro d'Italia to see the first mountain finish. Another flat stage was on the program today. Nevertheless, last year's winner should be particularly happy about this section: Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain Merida) was born in Messina. The stage in southern Sicily began in Pedara and took the riders north along the sea. Two escapees, Evgeny Shalunov (Gazprom-RusVelo) and Maciej Paterski (CCC Sprandi Polkowice), made their way early on. However, as expected, the sprinters didn't want to miss today's chance. It was the teams of André Greipel (Lotto Soudal), Fernando Gaviria (Quick-Step Floors) and Caleb Ewan (Orica-Scott) who didn't want to give the fugitives a big lead. Bahrain Merida also took part in the pace work and even tore the field into three parts for a short time. Incidentally, Javier Moreno (Bahrain Merida) was excluded from the Giro d'Italia after his fisticuffs against Diego Rosa.
Luka Pibernik celebrates too early – Fernando Gaviria celebrates rightly
While the city of Messina was reached, the field was able to catch the two breakaways. 15 kilometers from the finish, preparations for the mass sprint began on the final circuit. When Luka Pibernik (Bahrain Merida) suddenly spotted a gap behind him with one lap to go, he stepped up and cheered as he crossed the finish line – five kilometers early. At the end of the day he ended up in 148th place. The sprinter teams tried to build up the last few meters in a controlled manner, but the result was a rather uncontrolled mass sprint. André Greipel was installed and therefore could not start in time for his start. Sam Bennett (Bora-hansgrohe) started much earlier. But the Irishman was sprinted over by Fernando Gaviria. The Colombian already won the 3th stage. The Italian Jakub Mareczko (Wilier-Selle Italia) pushed in between Gaviria and Bennett. Fourth place was enough for Greipel.
