Cavendish Wins Extremely Bizarre Giro Stage Nine

Mark Cavendish scored Team Columbia's third consecutive stage win in the Giro d'Italia today in a finishing bunch sprint around the circuit race through Milan.

That, however, was not the main focus of today's race. 

In an extremely bizarre turn of events, the riders chose to take it easy today. The route featured 10 laps of a 16-kilometer course, but the first seven laps were taken at a much-too- lackadaisical 33 kph (20.5 mph). 

Why did this happen? There were several reasons involved. As many predicted, the course was exceedingly dangerous, with 25 sharp turns through the city on every lap, and parked cars on the side of the road. 

Even before the Giro started last week, Cyclingnews.com analyzed the route and said, "Mixing high speeds with lots of corners will make for frenetic and risky racing. Crashes look almost guaranteed."

To compound this directly to the organizers and fans, the entire peloton, which was travelling together at its leisurely pace, made a complete stop on the finish line with six laps to go at 15:48 local time. 

Race leader Danilo DiLuca (LPR-Brakes) grabbed a microphone and made a speech to the crowd. He apologized to the fans and spectators for not giving them the show they expected, and he also said that as a peloton, "we don't feel the need to risk it. [Even as professional cyclists,] the circuit is not adapted to our security." 

Another problem today was yet another on the part of the organizers. Before the day started, the organizers decided that no GC times would be taken today. That meant that only sprint points were up for grabs; the entire field would be awarded the same time regardless of where they finished, even way off the back.

To be sure, DiLuca's lead was safe even if he finished 10 minutes late, but that meant that breakaway attempts were virtually worthless as no time gaps would be recognized.

Finally, with the start of three laps to go, the racing started to unfold.  The speed quickly picked up to a more Pro-Tour-like 50 kph and Team Columbia, Liquigas, QuickStep, and Saxobank started lining up their riders in sprint-trains for the finish. 

The final few kilometers were hectic and saw the one and only attack of the day by Thomas Voekler (Bouygues Telecom) but he was swallowed up quickly by the Columbia-led peloton. 

In the finishing straight, it was none other than their top sprinter Mark Cavendish who took the win ahead of Allan Davis (QuickStep) and Tyler Farrar (Garmin). 

Tomorrow is the first official rest day for the peloton, so no racing until Tuesday's Stage 10. It is the longest stage of this year's race at a whopping 262 kilometers, and takes in three whopping climbs, including the famous Monginevro and Sestriere peaks.  This will be a very important stage for the GC contenders.