After today's dominant performance by Rigoberto Uran, many GC riders will be pleased to get an easy day to try to find out how to beat the strong Colombian. That's what they will get tomorrow when the Giro continues with a short flat stage. Being one of the only opportunities left for the sprinters, it is hard to imagine that the fast finishers will let this one slip away and all should be set for another big battle between the likes of Nacer Bouhanni, Giacomo Nizzolo, Luka Mezgec and Elia Viviani.

The course

The second week of the race ends with two big summit finishes in the weekend but the GC riders will get a small chance to lick their wounds or celebrate their gains from the time trial before heading into the mountains. At the same time, the sprinters will get their final opportunity for some time in the short 157km stage from Fossano to Rivarolo Canavese.

This is one of the shortest stages of this year’s Giro. After the start in Fossano, the route constantly heads north, initially through the Cuneo area, and then crosses the whole province of Turin. The first small climb comes in Bardassano, before crossing the Po River; the route then reaches the Canavese region and runs through most of it. The feed zone is set past Volpiano. The short, steep Rivara climb (category 4, 1.0km, 5.3%, max. 12%) will award KOM points; the route will then reach Rivarolo Canavese, where a 22km long circuit will lead back to the finish line.

The final circuit has a total length of about 22km. After crossing the finish line, the route runs across Salassa and Valperga, and then reaches Cuorgnè, where the intermediate bonus sprint is located. The route going back to Rivarolo Canavese is very fast as the riders will mostly travel along straight roads but the final kilometre is a significantly more technical. Just after the flamme ruge, the riders go right in a roundabout before taking a sweeping turn 750m from the line. Then it's a long, straight road until the riders go right in a roundabout. The final stretch has a length of just 220m, on -m wide, asphalted roadway and the final kilometre is slightly uphill with a gradient of 1.9%. The first 500m are the steepest with a gradient of more than 3% and then it levels out a bit towards the end.

The weather

After today's rainy stage, the riders will be pleased to know that they can expect better weather and summerlike conditions tomorrow. In light of the technical finish, the sprinters will appreciate the fact that it will stay dry on a beautiful sunny day. The temperature is expected to reach 22 degrees, making it the hottest day of the Giro so far.

The wind usually doesn't play much of a role in Italian races but tomorrow it could be different as it will be significantly more windy than usual. A rather strong wind will be blowing from a southeasterly direction all day and it will pick up as the stage goes on. This means that the riders will have the feared cross-tailwind for most of the stage before turning into a tailwind after passing Turin. Then it's a short crosswind section that leads onto the finishing circuit where the riders will first have a tailwind before turning into a headwind on the way back. With 3km to go it becomes a crosswind before the riders turn into a tailwind for the final 220m.

The favourites

The sprinters don't have an awful lot of opportunities left in this year's Giro d'Italia. After tomorrow's stage, only Wednesday's mostly rolling route and the final parade stage to Trieste are suited to the fast finishers as all other stages have big mountaintop finishes. Hence, there is virtually no chance that the fast finishers will miss out on their final opportunity in the third week of the race.

Everybody knows this and the stage is likely to start like any other sprint stage. All riders know that this is not a day for a breakaway and so the escape is likely to take off very early in the stage, with the pro continental teams likely to make a very dominant  presence in the small group. It would be no surprise to see Andrea Fedi and Marco Bandiera on the attack again, with the former keen to win the Fuga classification for most kilometres spent in a breakaway and the latter eager to extend his lead in the sprints competition.

After two hard stages and with two big summit finishes coming up, the GC riders will hope for an easy stage but things could become more complicated than they had hoped for. The strong wind will make the peloton significantly more nervous and we should be back to the kind of attentive racing that dominated the first week of the race.

Whether the wind is strong enough to split things is hard to say but a lot of teams will certainly keep an eye on their opportunities. Omega Pharma-Quick Step and BMC are both really strong in that kind of racing but everybody knows that Domenico Pozzovivo is often very poorly positioned. As they have all made it clear that the tiny Italian is a danger, it would be no surprise to see one of those teams, Belkin or Tinkoff-Saxo try to split things in the crosswinds. Things will be made a bit more complicated by the fact that there is only very little crosswind on the finishing circuit, meaning that the attacks have to be launched rather far from the finish.

Even if the peloton doesn't split, the cross-tailwind and the nervousness should make it a very fast stage and this will obviously make it impossible for the break to stay away. Giant-Shimano, FDJ, Trek and maybe Cannondale will lead the chase for most of the day but it would be no surprise if FDJ get a little less help after Bouhanni's dominant showings in the recent sprint stages. On the other, the rival sprint teams cannot allow themselves to let this opportunity to slip away and so they will certainly lend a hand if things become dangerous.

In any case, the stage should end in a bunch sprint and again the technical finale should suit Nacer Bouhanni perfectly. There will be a bit battle for position heading into the first of the late roundabouts as there will be little room to move up later on. With just a 220m finishing straight, everyone who wants to win the stage needs to be in the top positions going into the final roundabout and with a tailwind, the sprinters can allow themselves to launch their sprint right immediately after getting onto the home straight. Hence, positioning and acceleration will again be extremely important and the riders with the strongest teams will have clear advantage.

It is hard to look past Bouhanni as the race favourite. He may not have the strongest team but he has proved that he doesn't need to. The Frenchman positions himself excellently and no one is able to push him away from the wheel he has targeted. He only needs Sebastien Chavanel to protect him from the wind when he moves up in the finale and then he usually latches onto the wheel of the dominant lead-out train. Only in Dublin has he been poorly positioned and nothing suggests that he will make another mistake tomorrow.

At the same time, he has clearly proved that he is the fastest rider in the race and the short finishing straight suits his explosive sprinting skills down to the ground. The short climb should do nothing to slow him down as he seems to be climbing really strongly at the moment. Bouhanni is obviously the man to beat and tomorrow he could easily take his fourth stage win in a row.

Giacomo Nizzolo has been Bouhanni's closest challenge in the three latest sprints and this makes him the most dangerous rival. In the first two sprints, he actually came very fast at the end and seemed to be able to match Bouhanni's speed. In stage 10, however, Bouhanni proved that he is clearly faster than his Italian rival and the Frenchman needs to make a mistake for Nizzolo to take the win.

However, Nizzolo is not that far off the level of Bouhanni and if he starts his sprint in a better position, he may have a chance. Like Bouhanni, Nizzolo doesn't have the team that can control the finales but Danilo Hondo, Eugenio Alafaci and Boy Van Poppel have been really strong at positioning their Italian sprinter. Nizzolo hasn't really missed out yet and he is unlikely to do so tomorrow.

The technical finale suits him well and the small 500m climb inside the final kilometre should suit him really well. In stage 10, he was one of the first riders to crest the summit of the late climb and he is clearly climbing a lot better than most of his rivals. This should given him the advantage that could finally allow him to take a stage win.

Going into this race, Elia Viviani had sprinted so excellently in the Tour of Turkey but for some reason he doesn't seem to have the same kind of speed any longer. It's very unfortunate as his lead-out train has been the strongest in this race and if he had been at his usual level, he could have taken a lot of stage wins.

In stage 4, the Cannondale train crashed, in stage 7 they had to use up all their energy in the chase and in stage 10 most of the lead-out riders were dropped on the final climb but when the train has been intact, they have dominated the finales. Tomorrow positioning will be extremely important and the final climb should be great for the combination Gatto-Ratto-Viviani. We wouldn't be surprised if Ratto leads Viviani into the final roundabout in the first two positions and if that happens, Viviani could finally take his win.

When the Cannondale train has failed, Giant-Shimano have mostly dominated the sprint finishes but a combination of bad luck and a lack of speed has meant that the stage win is still missing for Luka Mezgec. For Mezgec to win, he needs to be perfectly positioned as he is not as fast as the likes of Bouhanni and Nizzolo and that could be difficult in tomorrow's stage.

For the Slovenian himself, the final climb is a great advantage but for his final lead-out men Tom Veelers and Bert de Backer it isn't. We doubt that they can keep up with the Cannondale train on the climb and so Mezgec will probably have to start his sprint from a little further back. This will make it hard to win.

In Dublin, the Sky train was the strongest and on paper the combination Eisel-Sutton-Boasson Hagen-Swift is a formidable one. Since then, things haven't really come together for the British team but they certainly have the firepower to dominate the finales. The final climb should suit Boasson Hagen and Swift perfectly and if the team  manage to position the pair on the front at the bottom, Boasson Hagen could lead Swift into the final roundabout. The Brit doesn't seem to be hampered too much by his crash and he has been sprinting really well in this race, making him an obvious winner candidate.

We have been really impressed by Roberto Ferrari's consistency in this race. Despite being on his own in the sprint finishes, he always manages to find a great position and this has allowed him to finish in the top 7 in all sprint finishes. The technical finale and the short finishing straight suits him down to the ground and as he is climbing better than ever, the small hill won't be too much of a disadvantage. If he gets onto the wheel of the dominant lead-out train, he has the speed to win.

Finally, we will select our jokers. With Nicola Ruffoni out of the race, Bardiani will be focusing on Enrico Battaglin and Sonny Colbrelli in the sprints. Being no pure sprinters, they are unlikely to win but with a climb, the finale suits them perfectly. They will probably arrive at the top much fresher than most of their rivals and this could allow them to sprint to a top result.

Katusha headed into this race with a clear focus on the GC but those ambitions have now been put to rest. Instead, the team is now eyeing stage wins and this means that Luca Paolini is free to give it a try in the sprints. The Italian tried in stage 10 but was held up by the crash in the finale. Tomorrow the late climb may inspire him to give it another go. The Italian is no pure sprinter but he positions himself excellently. The small climb suits him perfectly and we wouldn't be surprised to see him make it into the top 10.

CyclingQuotes' stage winner pick: Nacer Bouhanni

Other winner candidates: Giacomo Nizzolo, Elia Viviani

Outsiders: Ben Swift, Luka Mezgec, Roberto Ferrari

Jokers: Sonny Colbrelli, Enrico Battaglin, Luca Paolini