Diego Ulissi (Lampre-ISD) rode to a controversial win in stage seventeen of the Giro d'Italia today, sprinting out of a four man group to cross the line in second place behind Italian national champion Giovanni Visconti. Despite crossing the line first, the Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli rider was relegated to the back of the group by race commisaires for shoving his way past the 21 year old on the way to the line.
The young rider moved slightly to his left during his sprint, preventing his breakaway companion from coming around on that side, but it was decided that he was already close enough to the wall to make taking that route to the line a poor decision. Interestingly, Visconti could have won just as easily if he had gone right instead and used the open road.
There were no changes in the fight for the Maglia Rosa on the day, with Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Sungard) finishing the day with his dominant position, sitting 4 minutes and 58 seconds ahead of second placed overall Michele Scarponi (Lampre-ISD).
Today's stage began in earnest with several attacks early in the stage. It wasn't until the peloton had taken in close to 70 kilometers before a group of sixteen riders peeled off the front of the peloton. The group's closest threat to the general classification was HTC-Highroad's Kanstantsin Sivtsov, who was more than 12 minutes behind race leader Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Sungard), so the peloton allowed them some latitude. Included in the move were Hubert Dupont (AG2r La Mondiale), Christophe Le Mével (Garmin-Cervelo), Jan Bakelants (Omega Pharma-Lotto), Jesus Hernández (Saxo Bank-Sungard), Pablo Lastras (Movistar), Robert Kišerlovski (Astana), Giovanni Visconti (Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli), Diego Ulissi (Lampre-ISD), Eduard Vorganov (Katusha), Alberto Losada (Katusha), Ben Gastauer (AG2r La Mondiale), Mathias Frank (BMC Racing), Fabio Taborre (Acqua & Sapone), Addy Engles (Quick Step) and Francesco Failli (Farnes Vini-Neri Sottoli).
The escape was allowed a maximum advantage of 7 minutes and 45 seconds before the Liquigas-Cannondale led peloton began to whittle away at their advantage. With riders like Sivtsov, Le Mével and Dupont present, gaining too much time could put team leader Vincenzo Nibali's position in jeopardy. When the break began ascending the second category Passo del Tonale it was Giordani that was bestowed the dubious honor of being first to lose contact. He was shortly followed by Engels and, by the time they crested the top, the escape was still 14 strong with 64 kilometers left to race. Their advantage was still hovering over the 6 minute mark, with the Italian team still putting on pressure from behind.
The gap to the peloton continued to diminish rapidly, with the concerted effort from Liquigas-Cannondale being joined for a short time by Denis Menchov's Geox-TMC squad. By the time the race had 30 kilometers remaining, the escape's lead had been trimmed down to 3 minutes and 50 seconds with Sivtsov pushing the pace on the category 3 Aprica climb. The Belarusian tried several times to force a gap, and caused both Gastauer and Le Mével to fall off the pace.
Next from the break to try their luck was Dupont, with Lastras and Taborre quickly riding across to the Frenchman. The rest were soon able to come on terms. He hit the group hard again, with Frank the first to make it across, followed by Visconti and then the rest of the escape. Sivtsov put in another attack, but the escapees were all highly motivated with a Giro stage win in the balance.
Continuous attacking in the break saw them maintain their advantage as they rode under the 20 kilometers to go banner. Lastros was next to put in a massive effort, and he drew Italian champion Visconti from the group, who kept the pace high as they approached the technical descent that would funnel them down towards finish.
The stragglers managed to pull themselves back to the two leaders on the descent, with Lastros remaining at the front guiding them quickly down the mountain. The escape hit the flat 8 kilometer section before the finish with more than 3 minutes in hand. At the 3 kilometer mark it was Visconti, Lastros, Bakelants and Ulissi who were able to force a small gap over the others, leaving six behind to chase.
Lastros put in another big effort to drop the others, but the Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli rider knew he could take the sprint, and was able to shut it down quickly. Ulissi was next to launch a tester, but the Visconti, was immediately on terms. The Lampre-ISD rider went to the back for a quick respite, and then jumped the others to open up the sprint for the line. The Italian champion was coming quickly from behind, and Ulissi moved towards the barrier slightly and blocked the charging Italian's line to the finish. Visconti retaliated with a push and some choice words, restarted his sprint, and easily crossed the line first. The race commisaires were understandably unhappy with Visconti's actions though, and awarded the victory to Ulissi.