Philippe Gilbert (BMC) emerged as a surprise winner of the first of the three late mountain stages in the Giro d’Italia when he timed his effort perfectly to come out on top in stage 18 of the Giro d’Italia. Having been part of 12-rider breakaway, he limited his losses on the Monte Ologno, rejoined the front group on the descent and went straight past them to solo to his second win in the race. Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) attacked Mikel Landa (Astana) when the Basque had been caught up in a crash and joined forces with Ryder Hesjedal (Cannondale-Garmin) to put 1.13 into the rest of the GC contenders.

In the 2013 Vuelta a Espana, Philippe Gilbert came very close to the win in a big mountain stage but the Belgian came up short against Daniele Ratto on a brutally cold day in Andorra. Today he proved his versatility when he finally added a big mountain stage in a grand tour to his already impressive palmares.

Stage 18 of the Giro d’Italia was an almost completely flat affair until the riders hit the Monte Ologno with 45km to go. The ascent was one of the hardest of the entire race but as it summited 35km from the finish, it was always destined to be a day for a breakaway.

That made it a perfect target for Gilbert who had come up short in stage 17 when his late attack was neutralized by Tinkoff-Saxo. With his power on the flats, he had a good chance to join the right breakaway and if he could limit his losses on the Monte Ologno, his good descending skills and fast sprint would make him hard to beat.

Gilbert made perfect use of all his skills to win a stage that should maybe have been a bit too hard for him. Despite being up against several strong climbers in the break that decided the stage, he timed his effort perfectly to take a huge solo win.

"We said this morning that anyone in the team, apart from Caruso, could try to get into the breakaway, because we knew it was a stage when the breakaway might make it all the way to the finish. Everyone had a go and, in the end, we got away with two of us: Moinard and me, which was perfect," he said.

"I didn't know the climb, but last night we slept on the other side of the lake and one of the hotel staff said, "Look at that hill: that's tomorrow's climb." From, I don't know how many, maybe 20, kilometres away, it didn't seem so hard, but it turned out to be a very demanding climb. I suffered a lot but I rode at my rhythm, and I knew that, with such a long descent, it would be possible to regain the leaders. I reached them before the foot of the descent."

"Yes, definitely, because at the stage finish I had time to savour it during the final 3-4 kilometres, because I heard on the radio from Valerio Piva that I had a minute on the chasers, so I knew that, with a minute, the stage was won," he said when asked whether this was one of the best wins of his career.