Italy's Valerio Conti retains leader's pink jersey but Slovenian up to second ahead of Monday's first rest day
Sunday 19 May 2019 18:45, UK
Primoz Roglic emerged as the overwhelming favourite for the Giro d'Italia title after victory on Sunday's ninth stage, a 34.8km individual time trial from Riccione.
Conti (Team UAE) finished 3:34 behind Lotto Jumbo-Visma rider Roglic to stay in the overall race leader's position but it was Slovenia's Roglic bossed the time trial to crush most of the overall contenders with his stage-winning time of 51 minutes 52 seconds.
Among those, two-time champion Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain-Merida) of Italy limited the damage when he lost 1:05 following a strong showing in the finale, a 12.25-km climb in San Marino, to take fourth place. Belgian Victor Campenaerts and Dutchman Bauke Mollema finished second and third respectively.
"It's a perfect performance in my mind, I did a good job," said Roglic.
"I took it easy at the beginning and I gave it all at the end. It's nice to take some time over the other GC favorites but the Giro is far from over."
Briton Simon Yates (Mitchelton Scott) took a beating as he lost 3:11 to Roglic, and Spain's Miguel Angel Lopez ended up 3:45 off the pace after all the general classification contenders rode the stage in wet conditions.
It was a spectacular reverse of fortune for Yates, who had been strong in the opening time trial after warning his rivals they should be scared of him.
Overall, Conti, who is not among the main GC contenders, leads Roglic, also winner of the first time trial and holder of the pink jersey for the first five stages, by 1:50. However Roglic now has 1:44 on Nibali in the overall standings before the Giro hits the mountains.
Monday is the three-week race's first rest day before the race begins to head for the mountains with stage 10 on Tuesday heading from Ravenna to Modena. Tuesday and Wednesday's predominantly flat stages prepare the way for the mountain stages in the middle of the week.
