FGDI Stage 6: What's the story? Adriano Malori

Another stage, and another man in the race lead. Say hello to Adriano Malori.

Malori was part of a break that clipped off the front early in the stage, and soon had a nice little lead. The pace was high up front, and as the leading group thinned out, Miguel Rubiano decided to go alone with about 45km to go. Rubiano held on for the stage win, the remains of the break came in 1:10 behind, while the peloton left the chase too late and were 1:51 back.

We may be nearly a week into this Giro, but it took till today for us to have our first quitters. So, say goodbye to Thor Hushovd, Tyler Farrar, Pablo Lastras and Romain Feillu. And if they happened to be in your team, you can say goodbye to them earning more/any points for you. I see no new scores, but let's face it, those Manner in Strumpfhosen (that’s “men in tights” if my google translate and my GCSE German serves me right) are still leading.

I wouldn’t get too used to seeing Malori in Pink if I were you. It’s another tough day tomorrow, with some larger hills, that might see some of the big hitters come to the front of the race. Or at least see some of the big hitters crack big style.

FGDI Stage 5: A Lot Like Stage 2

You can’t keep a good man down. And even though his body may look like it was attacked with a belt sander, Mark Cavendish came through for another stage win today.

If The Cavitator is the fastest man in the world, then that probably makes Matt Goss the second fastest man in the world, and the young Australian earned yet another second place, and keeps the points jersey.

So, to the scores, and things are now looking slightly better for the Bile Beans, thanks to the win from Cavasaurus. And I was pleased to see Sacha Modolo sneak into the top 5 as well. My boys still have a lot of work to do if they don’t want to languish in mid-table obscurity though. At the top of the, table Männer in Strumpfhosen have an impressive lead for now, but they may struggle if Scarponi can't deliver in the mountains.

Tomorrow should see a break from the rough and tumble world of bunch sprints. As the race will be heading into some hills. They’re not super big, but they should be tough enough to keep the likes of  Cavaroo from winning.

FGDI Stage 4: Garmin Set Nav On Course For Pink

Ahh, the team time trial, when we are treated to the spectacle of a whole team working away in formation, riding a collection of bikes worth a very large amount of money. The sight must surely be one of the finest in the world of pro cycling, second only to a nicely turned-out podium girl.

Garmin-Baracuda are well known for their collective speed against the clock, and their Cervelo bikes are very expensive indeed, so it makes sense that they did the best ride of the day. The pace was a bit too high for their best placed rider at the start of the day, Alex Rasmussen. He was shelled-out along the route, but sacrifices have to be made, and Garmin now have the top four places on GC, with Ramunas Navarduaskas in the Pink Jersey.

Bad luck for Taylor Phinney then. BMC came in 31 seconds down on Garmin and he lost the race lead. He looked to be struggling at times, and nearly crashed. That ankle of his probably still smarts a bit, what with him having four stitches in it. Also finishing in about the same time were Sky, with their crash casualty from Monday, Mark Cavendish. Cav hasn’t got any stitches, but his arse does look like a side of bacon.

If Garmin’s win wasn’t a surprise, then Katusha’s second place probably was. They were only 5 seconds off Garmin’s time, and they did a good job for team leader J-Rod, getting him in the top ten. It must be their new and very expensive Canyon time trial bikes.

As far as the rest of the teamswent there were no big surprises. As expected Euskaltel came last, and the rest of the teams came somewhere in between. So, Kreuziger and Basso are still within a few seconds of each other, F Schleck is a bit further back, with Scarponi and Cunego further back still.

No scores as I write, but I know that the Bile Beans won't be topping the table after today.Should be a sprint tomorrow I'm hoping that Cav can ride through the pain to take another stage, and that some of my other boys can get up there too.

FGDI Stage 3: Goss Goes, Cav Crashes, Phinney Phucked

Matt Goss has had a fair few second places this year, but he finally got himself a win today.

So it was a good day for Matt Goss.

But things didn’t go so well for Mark Cavendish and Taylor Phinney, as they were among the riders who hit the deck in a finishing straight crash. Which looked to be caused by some erratic sprinting from Roberto Ferrari.

Phinney managed to finish the stage and hang onto his Pink Jersey, but he did get a few stitches in his ankle.

It’s a rest day tomorrow, as the race heads down to Italy, before the action starts again with the team time trial. In the meantime, we can look at the scores. I'm not doing very well, so I won't dwell on them, but instead point out that it's still very early days in the race.

FGDI Stage 2: Cavendish in Sprint Win Number 1

So Mark Cavendish won a stage of the Giro. Nothing unusual there, I’m sure you’ll agree. It normally seems to take him a few days to find his sprinting legs in a Grand Tour, but this year he’s off to a flying start with plenty of sprints still to come.

There’s not really much more to say, apart from this was his first win since the birth of his daughter Deliah Grace. Who was born to Cav’s girlfriend Peta Todd. (insert breastfeeding gag here)

If Cav keeps on wining like this, it’s going to make writing this blog tricky, as I used up all my Cav puns long ago. From a cheap pun standpoint, I’m still hoping for a race win by Vitaly Buts one day.

The scores after stage 2 didn't make a lot of sense, and they're no longer up, so best move on.

FGDI Stage1: Phinney Phinshes Phastest

Hello, I've been a bit late with these, but lets just get on and pretend we haven't had three Giro stages already...

Taylor Phinney is rumored to be the product of a genetics program operating in the USA in the early 90’s. It was hoped that by breeding fastman Davis Phinney with Connie Carter that a super cyclist would be the result. The experiment seems to have been a success. But, however good young Taylor’s genes are, it probably still takes a bit of effort to tear around the streets of Herning at well over 30mph. So the 21 year old Phinney now has a Grand Tour prologue win, to go alongside his Jr. Paris Roubaix win, and his world individual pursuit title. The boy could go far.

There was a spot on the Bile Beans for Phinney, but for some reason I changed my mind at the last minute, and went for “the next Robert Gesink’, Rabbobank’s Tom Slagter........ I don’t know what I was thinking, I threw away some easy points for a long-shot for the mountains and GC – it’s not even like the current Robert Gesink scores many Fantasy Cycling points. As usual though, it could have been worse. I could have picked Andreas Kloden or Thomas Dekker for my team. They are both handy riders for sure, but unfortunately, they are not riding the Giro this year, so if you did pick them, bad luck.

As far as the other contenders went, it was a good ride from Gerraint Thomas in second. Solid rides from GC hopefuls Basso and Kreuziger. And crappy rides from GC hopefuls Scarponi and Frank Schleck.

It seems the minileague scores are going through a “transitional” phase. Which means they don’t make a lot of sense at the moment. I can tell you that the Bile Beans aren’t doing very well. And I can tell you that Roulers are probably doing OK.

Giro A Go-Go

As some of you may have noticed, the Velogames Fantasy Giro is now open for business. I see there’s already some teams entered in the mini-league, and hopefully there’ll be a few more come the start of the Giro on Saturday.

I also see that you can look at the line-ups for other teams before the race starts. There’s some interesting choices out there for sure. I've already changed my team to a dummy team to stop anyone trying to steal my riders - I hope I remember to change it back again before the start, or if I don’t, I can at least hope for some early prologue glory. Although I like to keep the Bile Beans line-up close to my chest, I can tell you that I probably won’t be going for last year’s “winner” and Mark E Smith-alike Michele Scarponi.

He was recently awarded the trophy for last year’s race, after Alberto Contador finally got banned.

But let’s not forget that Scarponi has had a few problems of his own when it comes to getting banned, as he was one of the riders caught in operation Puerto. He’s not got much in the way of results this year, and he’s a bit pricey, so watch as he scores loads of points this year.