Cycling: Diego Ulissi has won the second stage of the Giro d'Italia. The Italian left Agrigento with Peter Sagan on the short final climb. Filippo Ganna defended the Maglia Rosa.
Breakaway king De Gendt on offense
On today's second day of the 103rd Giro d'Italia, a 149,0 kilometer section from Alcamo to Agrigento awaited the pros. The stage wasn't really flat. The course was quite wavy, especially in the first and last third. Five escapees therefore saw their chance of winning the day. formed the quintet Thomas de Gendt (Lotto – Soudal), Ben Gastauer (AG2R La Mondiale), Mattia Bais (Androni Giocattoli – Sidermec), Alessandro Tonelli (Bardiani – CSF – Faizanè) and Etienne van Empel (Vini Zabu – KTM). The former also immediately expressed an interest in the mountain jersey by winning the first mountain classification of the day. In the sprint classification he secured himself in the peloton Fernando Gaviria (UAE) the points before Arnaud Demare (Groupama – FDJ) and Peter Sagan (Bora – hansgrohe) – probably a foretaste of the next three weeks.
Ulissi completes UAE's perfect prep work
So strong team Astana lost after the fall of Miguel Angel Lopez in yesterday's time trial today the next Edelhelfer for Jakob Fuglsang. Der russe Aleksandr Vlasov had to get off the bike because of illness. As expected, the escapees were caught by the peloton around ten kilometers before the finish line. There the battles for position began as all teams wanted to position their captains before the final short climb. The UAE team did this perfectly. With a team attack in the middle of the hill, they drove the best sprinters tired. Peter Sagan (Bora – hansgrohe) was able to withstand the attack of Diego Ulissi (UAE) together with Mikkel Frölich Honoré (Deceuninck – Quick-Step) follow, but no longer sprint past.
🇮🇹@DiegoUlissi of 🇦🇪@TeamUAEAbuDhabi wins stage 2 of 🇮🇹@giroditalia #Turn #twist103 (📺@RaiSport) https://t.co/bGucE205Vo pic.twitter.com/9Kr1ge6sAB
- World Cycling Stats (@wcsbike) October 4, 2020