Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal) was a popular winner on Stage 8 of the Giro d'Italia in Naples, beating Davide Gabburo (Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) and Movistar's Jorge Arcas after a long day in the breakaway on a day for the attackers.
De Gendt was part of the initial breakaway from the stage start and 20-strong group that then splintered later in the race.
De Gendt and fellow Lotto Soudal teammate Harm Vanhoucke were joined by Davide Gabburo (Bardiani-CSF-Faizanè) and Jorge Arcas (Movistar) as they escaped the larger group that contained sprinting threats in Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix) and Biniam Girmay (Intermarché–Wanty–Gobert Matériaux).
The quartet worked well together to hold off the van der Poel group, but entered the final kilometre with the Dutchman, Girmay and Mauro Schmid (QuickStep Alpha Vinyl) breathing down their necks after a late surge.
Vanhoucke led out the front group and De Gendt launched his sprint from behind at the 200-metre mark, beating Gabburo and Arcas comfortably, the 35-year-old celebrating well in advance of the finish.
“Today was one of those days that suits me,” De Gendt said following the stage win. “It looks a little bit like the Barcelona stage in Volta a Catalunya - always up and down. It's hard to recover. It's also hard to close the gap.”
“But 10 years after the Stelvio stage, I finally won a stage in the Giro again. If you would have asked me two weeks ago, if I was able to win a stage in the Giro I would have said no because I was in such bad Shape. But now the good legs are coming.”
Juan Pedro López (Trek-Segafredo) retained the leader's pink jersey for another day after he marked another attack from second-placed Lennard Kämna (BORA-hansgrohe) in the latter part of the stage. In a day of no change at the top of the standings, Arnaud Démare (Groupama-FDJ) and Koen Bouwman (Jumbo-Visma) retained their points and mountains classification leads, while López also has the young riders category classification lead.
The Giro d’Italia continues on SBS with Stage 9 to Blockhaus. The formidable climbing stage looks set to establish the contenders from the pretenders with many describing it as the Queen stage of this year’s Giro d’Italia.
Watch from 7.25pm AEST on SBS On Demand with the SBS broadcast starting from 11pm AEST. WA viewers can tune in from 9pm AWST.
