DiLuca Wins Giro Stage 10, Puts Stranglehold on Pink

Race leader Danilo DiLuca (LPR-Brakes) showed his dominance in the Giro d'Italia by laying waste to his rivals on what many called the toughest stage of this year's race.

A daunting 262 kilometers faced the riders today, featuring the tough peaks of the Moncenisio, the Sestrierre, and the Pra Martino. 

Today featured a flurry of attacks and breakaways that lit up the racing from start to finish.

The first man to gain time was an unlikely candidate, the 2000 Giro winner Stefano Garzelli (Acqua e Sapone). 

Garzelli had already lost nearly seven minutes in the overall classification in the previous mountain stages, and while technically not too much of a threat, his skills and strength on the long-haul mountain stages had the LPR team working to reel him in.

At one point, Garzelli had built up a lead of 6:30 by himself, which nearly put him into "virtual pink" on the road.

Behind Garzelli were two main chasing groups. 

First, the ISD team pair of Giovanni Visconti and Andrey Grivko worked to bridge the gap up to Garzelli. 

Behind them was a group of four, also trying to bridge up to the lead, featuring Dario Cioni (ISD), Jose Serpa (Diquigiovanni), Charlie Wegelius (Silence-Lotto), and Felix Cardenas (Barloworld).

As the peloton climbed the brutal ascent of the Sestrierre, the group of four was quickly losing ground and were swallowed up by the LPR-led peloton on the 40-kilometer descent. 

Meanwhile, Visconti and Grivko had bridged the gap up front to Garzelli, but the trio had already lost their earlier advantage, having only two minutes to work with ahead of the chasing peloton going into the final climb of the Pra Martino, just 15 kilometers from the finish.

The fireworks back in the main field set off as the peloton started the final ascent. The Liquigas team of Ivan Basso took the reigns of the peloton and ate up the leaders' advantage on the road. 

With Garzelli and the ISD riders in sight with four kilometers of climbing left, Franco Pellizotti (Liquigas), fourth-place in last year's Giro, used his team's work to spring himself off the front and blew by the leaders. 

Garzelli managed to hang on to Pellizotti, while Visconti and Grivko were dropped. 

Behind, however, more excitement was being stirred. On the descent leading to the finishing town of Pinerolo, race leader DiLuca attacked and started to work up time against all the other race favourites. 

He bridged the gap to Pellizotti and then left him for dead. 

DiLuca promised the fans that today he would go foraging for the win; he did that and more. 

DiLuca came in solo to take the win ahead of all the classification favourites. Race contenders Denis Menchov (Rabobank) and Carlos Sastre (Cervelo) came in with Pellizotti 10 seconds behind the Killer.

Other race favourites Levi Leipheimer (Astana), Ivan Basso (Liquigas), and Michael Rogers (Columbia) lost even more ground and came in 29 seconds adrift. 

Thomas Lovkvist (Columbia) turned up as today's big loser and lost 1:39.

By finishing first, DiLuca earned a 20-second time bonus on top of the gap he earned on his rivals. He now takes a commanding lead on the general classification, leading Menchov by 1:20; Rogers, 1:33; Leipheimer, 1:40; Sastre, 1:54; and Basso 2:03. 

That may sound like a huge time advantage, but DiLuca faces more obstacles in the coming days. 

Tomorrow's 214-kilometer stage is mostly flat and either suited for a sprint finish or a long breakaway win.

However, DiLuca must already be worrying about Thursday's major difficulty of the Giro, the 62-kilometer Cinque Terre time trial. 

DiLuca has already said to the press that, as someone who is not a time-trial specialist, he is ready to lose two minutes to the TT racers such as Leipheimer, Menchov, and Rogers. 

Maybe with his stage win and large overall lead today, DiLuca really can lose that time and still be gunning for the overall win when the race ends in Rome in two weeks.