Dario Cioni led home Team Sky as Cadel Evans won a brutal seventh stage of the Giro d'Italia on Saturday.
World champion digs deep to repel rivals
Dario Cioni led home Team Sky as Cadel Evans won a brutal seventh stage of the Giro d'Italia on Saturday.
Australian world road race champion Evans dug deepest of all during the 222km trek from Carrara to Montalcino, a stage which was made even tougher by driving rain and two sections of
strade bianche, white-gravelled roads which had been turned into mud tracks.
He crossed the line ahead of Damiano Cunego (Lampre) and new leader Alexandre Vinokourov (Astana).
Cioni was just under three minutes behind in 24th place and is 25th overall, 7:21 behind Vinokourov on the general classification.
The Italian had been in touch throughout the day along with teammates Bradley Wiggins and Michael Barry, who finished 34th and 35th respectively.
"It was a tough day and every man for himself really," said Team Sky's sports director Sean Yates afterwards. "But there weren't any major incidents for us and everyone has come through it okay.
"Bradley got a hunger flat when he had been right in the mix with the leaders and as a result lost an extra three minutes or so. He was in the group with (David) Millar who finished just over a minute back of Evans and Vinokourov.
"That was unfortunate but the boys rode well and it's another lesson learned."
The honours went to Evans who attacked with Vinokourov 16km from the finish on the second
strade bianche and then again with 9km remaining.
The second move proved decisive and going under the flamme rouge Evans had only four other riders with him - Vinokourov, Cunego, David Arroyo (Caisse d'Epargne) and Marco Pinotti (HTC-Columbia).
And rather than being vulnerable at the head of affairs Evans simply kicked again on the uphill finish to ride his rivals into submission.
Vinokourov leads the GC by one minute and 12 seconds from Evans, with Millar (Garmin-Transitions) a further 17 seconds behind in third.
Testing times
The standings were blown apart by the testing conditions and Vincenzo Nibali (Liqugas), the previous holder of the leader's pink jersey, did well to limit his losses to 1:33 after battling back from a crash on a slick right-hand bend 34km from the finish.
The stage had started with a fast opening section as 52.5km were covered in the first hour and after 80km Nicki Sorensen (Saxo Bank) and Rick Flens (Rabobank) broke clear.
That attack lasted almost exactly 100km at which point Cioni briefly surged into the lead.
But it was the sections of
strade bianche - usually dusty white-gravelled roads - which defined one of the toughest stages in recent Grand Tour history.
The riders finished exhausted and caked in mud but there's unlikely to be any let up as Sunday's eighth stage culminates with a 21km-climb up Monte Terminillo.
And Yates reckons we're in for a fascinating day, explaining: "It's going to be interesting seeing who is going to try and control the race - it looks pretty open to me looking at the teams of the overall leaders."
