19 May 2023

Grenadiers defend on Crans Montana

Related riders

Geraint Thomas

Giro d'Italia stage 13: Le Châble › Crans-Montana, 74.6km.

Geraint Thomas and the INEOS Grenadiers maintained the race lead with a strong team performance after a shortened stage 13.

Thomas sprinted home with the other GC favourites atop Crans Montana after the Grenadiers combined well to prevent any attacks from Thomas' rivals.

The result sees the Welsh rider retain a two second lead overall, ahead of Primoz Roglic (Jumbo Visma), with Joao Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) 17 seconds back.

Adverse weather conditions saw the extreme weather protocol activated, which meant that the stage would be shortened to 74.6km and begin at the foot of the Cat 1 Croix de Couer climb.

At the start of the abridged stage, Ben Swift and Salvatore Puccio managed the breakaways in the early kilometres, with Laurens de Plus then taking over to bring back a large and dangerous group carrying a number of GC threats.

De Plus then worked hard to maintain a pace as a smaller group attacked, before Swift and Pavel fought back to the GC group after being dropped to lead the Grenadiers on the flat before the Crans Montana summit finish.

A superb effort from the Belgian saw him lead this small group at a strong pace on the final climb to deter attacks before Thymen Arensman led Thomas to the final kilometre, where he sprinted to the line with his GC rivals to maintain the maglia rosa.

Reaction

Geraint Thomas

Laurens de Plus

“It was a really solid team performance. EF put us under pressure from the start, but we managed to do a good job, then we re-grouped together with Swifty and Pavel ahead of the final climb.

“We made a solid pace on the last climb and made sure that G keeps the jersey.”