In the most recent Como finishes the short and steep Muro di Sormano opened the finale with 50 kilometres to go before the decisive action occurred on the Civiglio in the outskirts of Como. The dynamics will be different now, as the Muro is not included. After the Madonna del Ghisallo the riders don’t take a righthander to climb to Sormano, on the contrary, they go straight ahead to leave the mountains behind. The uphill action resumes again in the last lastst 30 kilometres with the climb San Fermo della Battaglia (2.7 kilometres at 7.2%), the Civilio (4.2 kilometres at 9.7%), and again the climb to San Fermo della Battaglia. A 3.7 kilometres downhill then leads onto the last 1.6 kilometres on the flat.
No fresh legs anymore at that stage. Not only is Il Lombardia the last big race of a long season, this edition takes in most climbing metres in the first half of the race. So the riders will be pretty worn out when they reach the finale.
So you have to be a versatile climber to survive the different kinds op uphill challenges, while descending skills come in handy, too. If a select group storms to the line a pair of fast legs is usefull as well.
Recent editions of Il Lombardia were won by Tadej Pogacar (2021, Bergamo finish), Jakob Fuglsang (2020, Como finish), Bauke Mollema (2019, Como finish), Thibaut Pinot (2018, Como finish), Vincenzo Nibali (2017 and 2015, Como finish), Esteban Chaves (2016, Bergamo finish), and Dan Martin (2014, Bergamo finish).
Favourites 2022 Tour of Lombardy
**** Julian Alaphilippe, Tadej Pogacar
*** Adam Yates, Jonas Vingegaard, Enric Mas, Pavel Sivakov
** Romain Bardet, Jakob Fugslang, Aleksandr Vlasov, Matej Mohoric, Sergio Higuita
* Alejandro Valverde, Michael Woods, Bauke Mollema, João Almeida, Thymen Arensman
– No Teuns and no Schachmann on startlist. Maybe it’s worth to add Bardet, Mollema, Uran or Nibali to the favourites’ list. Pozzovivo is impressive too.
– Alaphilippe 4 stars? He isn’t climbing well enough in recent years, descending is not enough to win it.