Jhonatan Narváez (Ineos Grenadiers) was the first maglia rosa of the 2024 Giro d’Italia after winning stage 1 to Turin. However, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) confirmed his intentions and gained time on all his GC rivals with his usual and widely expected show of force during the hilly finale of the 140km opening stage.
Thanks to the time bonuses of 10, six and four seconds, Narváez leads second-placed Maximilian Schachmann (Bora-Hansgrohe) by four seconds, with Pogačar third overall at six seconds.
The trio finished 10 seconds ahead of the other GC contenders, so Pogačar immediately gained a total of 14 seconds on his GC rivals. More importantly, he showed he can distance them on steep short climbs and so perhaps can cause even bigger time gaps on the longer climbs like Sunday’s 11.4km haul to the Oropa Sanctuary.
A total of 17 riders finished in the chase group that crossed the line behind the trio of Narváez, Schachmann and Pogačar, all perhaps happy not to have lost more time after an intense shakeout on the 1.4km San Vito climb that ended just three kilometres from the finish in Turin.
Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) was there, as was Ben O’Connor (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), Mauri Vansevenant (Soudal-QuickStep), Eddie Dunbar (Jayco AlUla), Esteban Chaves (EF Education-EasyPost), Giulio Pellizzari (VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè), Antonio Tiberi and Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious), Attila Valter and Cian Uijtdebroeks (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Dani Martinez (Bora-Hansgrohe). Juan Pedro López (Lidl-Trek) was a little further back at 20 seconds but saved his day.
Others were not as strong on the climbs as UAE Team Emirates and then Pogačar tried to hurt everyone, while also hurting their own climbing domestiques.
Mikkel Bjerg blew the GC group apart on the Colle Maddalena, 20km from the finish in Turin, and Domen Novak and Felix Großschartner were unable to stay in the front group and so later help Pogačar. Only Rafał Majka was with Pogačar when the race was really on, exposing UE Team Emirates’ over-enthusiasm and lack of quality climbers.
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Pogačar tried to shrug off the disappointment and tactical weaknesses and could look at his time gains. Several overall rivals are already out of touch and rival teams have been weakened.
Australian national champion Luke Plapp (Jayco-AlUla), Nairo Quintana (Movistar) and Romain Bardet (dsm-firmenich PostNL) lost 57 seconds, while Thymen Arensman (Ineos Grenadiers) lost 2:17 after all suffered on the Colle Maddalena climb. Florian Lipowitz (Bora-Hansgrohe) also lost 2:25, a surprise after his impressive performance at the recent Tour de Romandie.
Arensman finished sixth overall in the 2023 Giro d’Italia as he worked for Geraint Thomas but Ineos Grenadiers were surprised by his poor performance. They can only hope he will be better later in the race and on longer climbs.
“It’s obviously a long race, we don’t know yet what’s happened with Thymen,” team manager John Allert told Eurosport.
“He’s going to regroup with us tonight and we’ll have a look. But ultimately we still have plenty of cards to play in this race and there’s 21 stages. We’re going to make sure that we’re right there at the end.”
After stage 1 to Turin, the time gaps amongst the GC contenders are seconds. Stage 2 to Oropa will show which are destined to become minutes during the next three weeks.
Giro d’Italia results
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Giro d’Italia classifications
These are the jersey classification at the 2024 Giro d’Italia.
Click here for a more comprehensive rundown of all the classifications and prize money, including the intermediate sprints prize and the fighting spirit prize.
Maglia rosa – The pink jersey is worn by the overall race leader on the general classification who has completed the stages in the lowest accumulated time. Jhonatan Narváez (Ineos Grenadiers) wears the maglia rosa after his stage 1 victory.
Maglia ciclamino – The cyclamen jersey indicates the points classification leader. Riders accrue points each stage at the two intermediate sprints and at stage finishes. The rider with the most points leads the ranking and wears the cyclamen jersey. Jhonatan Narváez (Ineos Grenadiers) scored 25 points for winning the stage and so is the leader of the points competition. However he will wear the pink jersey on stage 2 and so Filippo Fiorelli (VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè) will wear on Sunday.
Maglia azzurra – The blue jersey is for the mountain classification. Points are handed out to the first riders over specific categorised hills and mountain climbs during the Giro. The highest and steepest mountains award the most points. The rider with the most points leads the ranking and wears the blue jersey. Lilian Calmejane (Intermarché-Wanty) wears the blue jersey after being the first to the top of the Colle Maddalena climb.
Maglia bianca – The white jersey is for the leader of the best young rider classification. It is calculated b[based on the time races, like the maglia rosa, but only riders aged 25 or under are eligible to win it and wear it. Alex Baudin (Decathlon AG2R) finished fourth on the stage and so is the best placed young rider after stage 1.