It’s highly unlikely that a sprint team will want to control the race. The route is way too challenging for fast men, while the finale is a tough task, too. That is, if your fast legs are your biggest asset. The final 20 kilometres begin with a prolonged false flat before a rolling section leads to the trying last kilometre. The last 500 metres even go up with an average gradient of 10.8%.
Probably, the GC men will keep their powder dry on this arrival. So that opens up the road for a group of bal attackers to bring an early break home. The likes of Tim Wellens and Luis León Sánchez are in fine form, while Davide Formolo won a stage with a similar profile in the 2015 Giro d’Italia. He was the best attacker on the fourth day, a race that traveled through the middle mountains to La Spezia.
Favourites 4th stage 2018 Giro d’Italia
*** Tim Wellens, Luis León Sánchez, Davide Formolo, Giovanni Visconti
** Diego Ulissi, Gianluca Brambilla, Zdenek Stybar, Alexey Lutsenko, Matej Mohoric
* Alessandro De Marchi, Tony Martin, Koen Bouwman, Ben Hermans, Valerio Conti
Read also: route 4th stage 2018 Giro d’Italia.
Giro d’Italia 2018 stage 4: Route maps, height profiles, and more
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