Marcel Kittel (Giant-Shimano) left no one doubting who is the strongest sprinter in this year's Giro d'Italia when he made his rivals look like young neo-pros in the sprint on the third stage of the race. Being poorly positioned, he seemed to be completely out of the running but launched a incredible sprint from far out to pass Ben Swift (Sky) and Elia Viviani (Cannondale) just metres before the line. Michael Matthews (Orica-GreenEDGE) crashed near the end of the stage but still managed to finish in the top 20 to defend his overall lead.

 

Yesterday Marcel Kittel proved that he is unrivalled when it comes to sprinting in this year's Giro d'Italia, making a long sprint from far out to easily hold off his rivals. Today he made it two in a row by producing an even more impressive effort in the third stage of the race.

 

When the riders entered the final s-turn just 400m from the line, it seemed that it would not be a day of glory for Kittel who found himself far behind in the long line of riders that led the peloton. Instead, the Cannondale and Sky teams had proved superior in launching their sprinters and it was Daniele Ratto and Edvald Boasson Hagen who gave their sprinters the perfect lead-out, with the Norwegian taking over for the Italian just before the turn.

 

Boasson Hagen had Viviani on his wheel while Swift and Davide Appollonio (Ag2r) followed in the next positions. Like Kittel, Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ), Roberto Ferrari (Lampre-Merida) and Giacomo Nizzolo (Trek) also found themselves out of position and with the peloton riding single file, it seemed that it was down to a two-horse race with between Swift and Viviani.

 

While the pair went head-to-head on the front, Kittel closed his eyes and did a long sprint with an amazing power. He made some of the world's best sprinter look like junior racers when he passed them all and managed to catch Swift and Viviani just before the line, opening up a massive gap to Bouhanni in the process.

 

Swift had easily beaten Viviani and probably thought that he had taken his first grand tour victory but on his right-hand side he could see the red jersey of Kittel approaching. He had to settle for second while Viviani took third.

 

The sprint came at the end of a very hectic stage where the windy conditions made the peloton significantly more nervous than it had been on the first road stage in Northern Ireland. All the big teams made sure to constantly stay in the front positions and unfortunately it brought about a few crashes.

 

Michele Scarponi (Astana), Damiano Cunego (Lampre-Merida) and maglia rosa holder Michael Matthews were some of the riders to go down and while they all managed to rejoin the peloton, the latter was clearly suffering. He still managed to finish in the top 20 though and so defended his lead on the eve of the first rest day of the race.

 

In fact an 11-second split occurred in the finale and as Matthews was the only Orica-GreenEDGE rider to be on the right side, he now finds himself with an 8-second lead over Alessandro Petacchi (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) who moved into second. He will bring that lead back to Italy as the peloton takes an early rest day to return to the race's home country.

 

Racing resumes on Tuesday with a short, flat stage from Giovinazzo to Bari and with no categorized climbs at all, it should be another one for the fast finishers.

 

One for the sprinters

For the second day in a row, the sprinters were expected to step into the spotlight when the Giro d'Italia continued with the final of its three stages on the Emerald Isle. The 189km brought the riders from Armagh to the Irish capital of Dublin and after a slightly hilly start with two categorized climbs, the stage ended with a flat run along the coast. With more wind expected, however, a nervous day in the saddle was expected.

 

After yesterday's very wet affair, the riders again took off under torrential rain when they headed out from Armagh just south of Belfast on their long journey to Dublin. Unlike yesterday, there was also a lot of wind that could make it a tricky affair for the 196 remaining riders in the race. All riders who finished yesterday's stage took the start, including Giampaolo Caruso (Katusha) who crashed yesterday and will undergo further examinations on his wrist on the rest day.

 

An easy start

These early flat stages of the grand tours are usually very controlled affairs and so the breakaways often take of rather early. Even though it took a bit more time for the move to get established than it did on stage 2, it was again a rather slow start to the stage.

 

At the 6km mark, KOM leader Maarten Tjallingii (Belkin) lived up to his promise of going on the attack in a quest to defend his blue tunic when he took off with Miguel Angel Rubiano (Colombia), Yonder Godoy (Androni Giocattoli) and Gert Dockx (Lotto Belisol). They quickly got a 40-second gap while Giorgio Cecchinel (Neri Sottoli) took off in pursuit.

 

Tjallingii takes points

The peloton was content with the situation and allowed the gap to grow to 3 minutes at the 9km mark. 6km further up the road, Cecchniel's hard work paid off and he joined the leading quartet.

 

At the 25km mark, the gap had reached 6 minutes as Orica-GreenEDGE had now hit the front and started to control the situation. The Australian team made sure that the gap did not become any bigger and kept it stable between the 5- and 6-minute marks. Meanwhile, Tjallingii made sure to crest the summit of the first climb in first position to add another 3 points to his KOM tally.

 

Tuft takes control

Tjallingii repeated the feat a little later on the second climb to make sure that he keeps the blue jersey until Wednesday when the next KOM points are on offer. Behind, Svein Tuft had stepped back into the domestique role and took responsibility to bring down the gap which was down to just 3.25 with 114km to go.

 

As the escapees crossed the border into Ireland, they were greeted by sunny conditions that briefly took over from the rain and from there it was constant mix between rain and sun. The organizers celebrated the arrival on Irish soil by offering the day's bonus sprint in the city of Dundalk where Tjallingii did a long sprint from the front to easily take the points ahead of Godoy and Rubiano.

 

Belletti crashes

With 99km to go, the first of several crashes took place. While Wilco Kelderman (Belkin) was not too badly hurt, the situation was different for Androni sprinter Manuel Belletti who took a long time to get back on his bike. He faced a long, hard chase to rejoin the peloton and didn't make the junction until more than 30km later.

 

It was still Tuft doing all the work and he brought the gap down to just 1.55 with 88km to go. Until then, there had been a lot of nervousness in the peloton, prompted by the windy conditions, but the peloton now allowed themselves a natural break. While almost half the peloton stopped - including Matthews -Tuft slowed down and the gap went back up to 4.10.

 

Back to work

Having exited the feed zone, it was time to get back to work for Tuft who was now joined by Arnaud Courteille (FDJ) in the handling of the pace-setting. Moments later, Giant-Shimano also put Tom Stamsnijder on the front and the trio started to gradually bring down the gap.

 

The peloton started to get significantly more nervous as all the teams positioned themselves for the windy finale and this made the tension increase. With 59km to go, a big crash happened near the front, with Matthews being one of several riders to go down.

 

Scarponi and Cunego crash

The worst affected teams were Lampre-Merida and Astana who both had several riders involved in the incident but as the peloton slowed down to wait for them, they all managed to rejoin the peloton. As a consequence, the gap went up to 4.10 with 55km to go.

 

With Matthews being hurt, Tuft stopped his chase effort and instead it was Stamsnijder and Courteille who again upped the pace a little later. Those two riders brought the gap down to 3 minutes with 40km to go.

 

With 33km to go, another crash happened and this time Cameron Meyer (Orica) and Boasson Hagen were involved. The former seemed to be groggy but managed to get back on his bike and finish the stage.

 

A nervous peloton

This time there was no slowing down though as the windy conditions made the peloton very nervous. Jussi Veikkanen had taken over from teammate Courteille while Astana, BMC, OPQS and Tinkoff-Saxo had positioned their trains next to them.

 

Due to the fierce pace, the gap melted away and it was down to 50 seconds with 25km to go. Christopher Juul, Manuel Quinziato, Enrico Gasparotto and Julien Vermote led their respective trains that all waited for the moment to attack.

 

Tinkoff-Saxo try to attack

Tinkoff-Saxo made their move 16km from the finish when Juul and Ivan Rovny strung on the peloton. BMC took over with Quinziato, Daniel Oss and Danilo Wyss and the peloton was constantly on the verge of splitting up.

 

The gap went down to 15 seconds but as the peloton entered less exposed roads in a town, they slowed down. The escapees had now given up and were not really riding but suddenly the peloton almost came to a standstill, with several team riding next to each other on the front.

 

A strange race

For several kilometres, the break dangled those 15 seconds ahead of the bunch while Rubiano decided to wait for his chasers. As Cecchinel was the only one really interested in keeping the break alive, he attacked 8km from the line while his companions fell back to the peloton.

 

The bunch gradually speeded up and swallowed up Cecchinel 7km from the line. While Nicolas Roche (Tinkoff-Saxo) suffered a very untimely puncture, Cannondale finally decided to take control, with Paolo Longo Borghini significantly upping the pace.

 

Cannondale take control

8 riders from the green team hit the front while the Giant train was looming next to them. While Davide Villella, Michel Koch and Alan Marangoni all took turns on the front, Bernhard Eisel moved up with the Sky train and suddenly Sky, Giant-Shimano and Cannondale were lined out next to each other.

 

FDJ joined them on the front and it was a long sprint to get into the left-hand turn 1.5km from the line in first position. Cannondale won the battle as Michel Koch led the peloton under the flamme rouge.

 

Ratto now took over with Boasson Hagen, Viviani and Swift on his wheel while Kittel and Bouhanni had fallen far back. It seemed that it was a battle between Viviani and Swift but Kittel refused to give up and did an impressive sprint to take his second consecutive win.