I came, I saw, I broke away! Pogacar leaves breadcrumbs, unmatched Steinhauser scoops them up after lengthy solo ride

After Tuesday's chaotic, Tadej Pogacar-led stage to Monte Pana, on Wednesday the peloton rode up to the Brocon Pass, which would mark the end of a day with more than four thousand meters of elevation gain. Along the way a typical Dolomites stage awaited the riders, with famous climbs like the Passo Sella and the Passo Rolle. A beautiful selection of climbs provided plenty of opportunities for brave attackers and GC contenders looking to bust a move.

From the starting point in Selva di Valgardena, the peloton faced a climb up to one of Italy’s most beautiful passes: the Passo Sella. This is also where they encountered the Cima Coppi, the highest point in this edition of the Giro, at 2244 meters (as the Umbrail Pass had been removed from the schedule on Tuesday). At Passo Sella, we saw quite a few attacks, but no decisive breakaways. Therefore, the battle for the Cima Coppi gave us our first real dose of fireworks in this stage. Giulio Pellizari made a long-range move, was nearly caught by the cunning Nairo Quintana, but ultimately made it just in time.

In the descent from the Sella Pass, which was long and fast, several groups clumped together. Leading up to the Passo Rolle, a not too steep but long climb, a breakaway group of ten riders formed: Quintana (Movistar), Pellizari (Bardiani), Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal Quick-Step), Georg Steinhauser (EF Education-EasyPost), Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious), Marco Frigo (Israel-Premier Tech), Davide Ballerini (Astana) and Amanuel Ghebreigzabhier (Lidl-Trek), joined by Attila Valter (Visma | Lease a Bike) and Nicola Conci (Alpecin-Deceuninck). However, their escape was short-lived.

Leading up to the next climb, the Passo Gobbera, suddenly dsm-firmenich PostNL took the lead in the peloton. The lead of the breakaways dropped from two minutes to half a minute. On the Gobbera, the breakaways were caught. dsm-firmenich's efforts had a large part of the peloton drop back. Einer Rubio and Filippo Zana were also briefly struggling. The tone had been set. From that point onwards, the race was tough, and the stage victory highly coveted.

Seemingly aware that leading only benefited GC leader Pogacar, Bardet later stopped putting his men at the front. After all, no one rides as hard in this Giro as the Slovenian, and cranking up the pace like that seemed to lead UAE to another easy stage victory. Bardet did not really attack, causing doubt in the peloton. Several early breakaways happened. Steinhauser and Ghebreigzabhier broke away again, while Frigo and Christian Scaroni also made their moves. There was little action happening in the group on the first pass over Passo Brocon, but Steinhauser reached the top with a considerable lead after dropping his Eritrean companion.

The young German managed to stay upright during the wet descent and approached the final climb of the Brocon from its steeper, more rugged side. Behind him, Gebreigzabhier and Frigo found themselves isolated, while the main peloton appeared to hold back, trailing by 2 minutes and 20 seconds. The top contenders were not making moves, with Pogacar likely not allowing anyone to push the pace, creating an unusual status quo. As they neared the final ascent, the Brocon loomed for one last climb.

At the base of the climb, INEOS Grenadiers took the lead in the peloton, likely aiming to put pressure on Dani Martinez. Steinhauser continued to press forward, extending his lead to 2 minutes and 40 seconds. It seemed that the breakaway had the tacit approval of the pink jersey, who showed no interest in contending for the stage win that day. It was only in the final kilometers that the pace in Pogacar’s group picked up. with Thymen Arensman’s intense pacing, the group stayed together until Ben O'Connor was dropped. This prompted Martinez to accelerate, finally leading to that much-awaited burst of action among the big names.

All these developments unfolded a solid way behind Steinhauser. The German maintained a solid pace through the challenging final kilometers, navigating through the lush, dense forests of the Brocon. He was unmistakably the standout rider in the breakaway. Arriving solo at the Brocon, he had ample time to savor his victory. In the meantime, Pogacar began to put some distance between himself from the others. Tiberi finished just half a minute behind the pink jersey, closely followed by Thomas and Rubio. O'Connor, on the other hand, ended up being the least fortunate of the day, falling behind by a significant thirty seconds.