Sanchez wins Stage 6 as Pogacar and Thomas avoid gravel drama

Pelayo Sanchez (Movistar) saw off Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal Quick-Step) in a thrilling dust-up to win Stage 6 of the Giro d’Italia from a three-man breakaway as the GC big-hitters survived the white gravel of Tuscany.

Sanchez, Alaphilippe and Luke Plapp (Jayco AlUla) splintered off the front of a larger break with around 42km remaining and worked well together – save for the odd heated discussion and misjudged roundabout.

Despite the pace being increased behind, particularly on the three gravel sectors, the trio held on into the finish, where Sanchez and Alaphilippe left Plapp behind before the Spanish debutant proved the strongest in the race to the line.

The much anticipated 180km strade bianche stage was one that a lot of teams and even more riders had circled in their roadbooks. As battle commenced at kilometre zero, only UAE Emirates and Ineos Grenadiers, the teams of maglia rosa Tadej Pogacar and second-placed Geraint Thomas, were uninterested in installing a rider in the breakaway.

As a consequence the “early” tussles lasted until they had covered more than half of the course. All of the big name contenders – those that didn’t have general classification ambitions – seemed to try their luck at one point, only to be brought back by those unhappy to have missed out. The first hour of the race covered 51.8km, making it by 4kph the fastest of the week.

It took the first and most significant of the two categorised climbs, the Volterra, for the race to adopt a more regular shape. And only towards the top of it as a group of a dozen or so gave it their all to establish a gap and carry it onto the descent after the walled city.

Sprinter Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck) was the biggest surprise of those present, along with Alaphilippe and Sanchez. They would soon after be joined by Plapp, Matteo Trentin (Tudor Pro Cycling), Filippo Fiorelli (VF Group-Bardiani-Faizane) and Andrea Vendrame (Decathlon AG2R.)

UAE Emirates allowed the break to eke out a gap for the next 30km until the clock hit three minutes, when they began to control things, evidently unwilling to relinquish the maglia rosa to best-placed breaker Plapp, who began the day 2’33” down on Pogacar in the general classification.

Though they seemed more willing to allow the leaders to take the stage, the three slippery, steep sectors of dusty gravel presented challenges of their own. The first saw a minute come off the lead, while the second brought it down to ninety seconds. It was back to two minutes again by the third, which came 18km from the finish. By this point the six had become three, with only Alaphilippe, Sanchez and Plapp surviving.

Despite Ineos Grenadiers hitting the front with a vengeance in the final phase of the race, and Sanchez costing himself several precious seconds by messing up his line on a roundabout, the three were determined to make it to Rapolano Terme without getting caught.

After Plapp led them into the home straight, it was Alaphilippe who kicked first, 200m from the line. Sanchez didn’t miss a beat and had the strength remaining in his legs to come round and take the victory by five bike lengths from the Frenchman.

A late attack from Andrea Piccolo (EF Education-EasyPost) was sufficient to see him ride clear for fourth place.

Stage winner Sanchez said afterwards that he had “been trying to save energy” for this stage.

“I thought that today I could be in the breakaway but I could never imagine winning here. At the end I was with Plapp and Alaphilippe and tried to collaborate with them, and also tried to drop them but it was impossible, so I tried with the sprint. Luckily I was the fastest.”

Plapp felt the trio “worked reasonably well to the finish”.

“We played games a bit. I was half eyes on looking for [general classification] time and half [eyes] on the stage. I ended up riding a bit harder than the others, but in the end I’m happy,” he said

Pogacar and Thomas survived a lively finale to retain their positions at the top of the general classification. Pogacar leads Thomas by 46″ heading into Stage 7’s individual time trial.

“It was a great job all day from the team,” said Thomas. “Everyone did an amazing job keeping us at the front, out of trouble. We took the lead on the sectors to keep out of trouble – we had to. Every man was great and good to see Thymen [Arensmen] has got some good legs back.”