PG - Giro d'Italia 2021 Stage 9

The Course

A tough day in the saddle with a cat 1 climb to finish with and the last couple of k are on gravel and over 8%. There'll be 3400 metres of gain over the 158 km stage. (There's nearly always actually more than the road book says in the Giro...) and though there'll be plenty of climbers hoping they can get away on the first uncategorised climb and stay away, it's got showdown for the GC guys written all over it whether it's for the win or not

The Favourites

It's not the hardest climbing day we'll see this year. Most of the gradients are well within reach of the puncheurs, let alone the climbers. It will really depend on how they race the first 3/4 of the stage. Will the Skinnies want to make it tough for Bernal who is looking good? If they do then the break will be doomed. If not, then there'll be an array of contenders who given a good enough lead, will duke it out on the gravel.

Here's the startlist for your perusal.

The Rules

In this game, only the race results matter. You're not committed to keeping the same riders throughout the series, you make fresh picks before every race. Our overall competition is just the sum of individual race scores. You're eligible for the overall even if you miss some races.

Pick 4 riders for the upcoming race. The order of your picks doesn't matter. All of your riders can score.

Riders score points down to 10th place. Less popular riders score more points than heavily-picked favourites. See below for scoring details.

The strict entry deadline is the official start time of the race, the neutralized roll-out or Départ Fictif. Be warned - if your post is timestamped one minute late your entry won't count! So do remember that there's no disadvantage to getting an entry in early, even the day before, because you may always change your picks up until the deadline. Feel free to rethink your picks when it emerges which riders are more or less popular with other players. If you make changes, post your revised 4 picks in a reply to your original post.

The Scoring