A four-man sprint won thanks to a sudden, practically perfect twist, like a true pistard. This time, however, the Giro d’Italia does not speak blue, the winner of the fifth stage, the 178 kilometer Genoa-Lucca, was Benjamin Thomas: the Frenchman from Cofidis preceded his three breakaway companions, the Dane Michael Valgren (EF Education -EasyPost), the Italian Andrea Pietrobon (Team Polti Kometa) and his compatriot Enzo Paleni (Groupama-FDJ).
Disappointment for Pietrobon himself who, one kilometer from the finish line, tried to attack on the counterattack, after having gained a good margin the Italian was caught up at the end: Jonathan Milan was fifth, the Friulian sprinter regulated the sprint of the disappointed group. Unexpected events and emotions were not lacking even in the fifth stage of the Corsa Rosa: the entire stage was marked by two different rhythms, the first infernal imposed by the three teams that took the lead, namely Lidl-Trek, Alpecin-Deceuninck and Soudal Quick -Step, the second mildest which allowed the four to reach a good lead which remained constant until the finish line.
Not even the attempt to patch things up in the final stages was successful, two falls affected the pursuit by the entire peloton: the one celebrating was the French expert in track racing, with his first victory of the season on the road. “This is a truly special emotion, I dreamed of a victory in the Giro d’Italia. I’m not a great road champion, but today I had my day as a champion. Sometimes you have to take risks, if we don’t take risks we won’t win anything in life, it was a long battle against the group. In the end it went well, today it had to go like this, I’m really happy”, he declared to Rai Sport. Nothing changes however from the point of view of the general classification, Tadej Pogacar remains in the squad: “So far every day has been interesting, today it was hot, it was a crazy finish, with this escape that reached the finish line – explained the champion Slovenian from UAE Team Emirates – I always like to see group sprints, sprinting to try to win, however it was an interesting finish. Tomorrow we’ll see, we can take risks, we’ll try to avoid them. It will be a crazy day too Tomorrow”.
The Torre del Lago Puccini (Viareggio)-Rapolano Terme of 180 kilometers is all to be followed: from Volterra onwards the dirt road divided into three sectors will start for a total of 12 kilometres, the ideal route for a Pogacar who has every intention of place another decisive action.