Lars Bak of Lotto-Belisol won Stage 12 of the Giro d'Italia by attacking a seven-rider breakaway in the final two kilometers, while behind him FDJ’s Sandy Casar and BMC’s Ivan Santaromita fought to take the leader’s pink jersey.
In the end Katusha’s Joaquim Rodriguez held onto the race lead by 17 seconds over Ryder Hesjedal. Casar moved into third in the General Classification, 26 seconds down.
“It was a tough race—I was lucky to get away in a strong group at the start of the race,” Bak said on the Lott website. “From the car, [directeur sportif] Marc Wauters guided me very good in the final part of the race. I knew it was going to be a hard sprint and, not being a sprinter, I took my chance.”
“Obviously this is my biggest win ever. My last victory was seven years ago, but this is something else. This is a big tour. It’s going great with Lotto Belisol. We were here to get away in the escapes and I think Lotto Belisol has been seen every day in the Giro. There will probably be two more chances to get away in the upcoming stages, before going into the mountains. We will try our luck, because we have nothing to lose.”
The break, originally seven, then nine riders, got away 45 kilometers into the 155-km route, attacking on the first of four categorized climbs.
Sandy Casar (FDJ-BigMat,) Ivan Santaromita (BMC,) Jan Bakelants (RadioShack-Nissan,) Andrey Amador (Movistar,) Michal Golas (Omega Pharma-Quick Step,) Lars Bak (Lotto Belisol,) and Amets Txurruka (Euskaltel) formed the original break. Jackson Rodriguez (Androni Giocattoli) and and Martijn Keizer (Vacansoleil-DCM) bridged to the break about 40 km after the escape.
Casar was 4:01 down in the General Classification, Santaromita 4:16, so both had a chance to take the maglia rosa if the break survived. The peloton seemed unconcerned by the break, despite the presence of Casar and Santaromita; neither was considered a serious GC contender in the long run.
Katusha seemed completely uninterested in defending the pink jersey, and for most of the stage, no other team took up the chase. Long stages, lots of hills and high speeds for sprint finishes have worn out riders who want to save their legs for the mountain stages. Teams with riders seriously harboring GC ambitions probably didn’t see any value in burning up their legs on stages which would not be decisive.
Finally Liquigas took up the chase, cutting the seven-minute gap down to three minutes at the end. Possibly Liquigas wanted Katusha to keep the jersey and the pressure to defend it.
The break rode together until the Cat 2 climb of Valico La Mola, when Omega Pharma-Quickstep’s Michael Golas attacked. The Polish rider had captured all the King of the Mountain points, so no one marked him when he sprinted ahead at the top of the third climb. This time he kept going, taking a lot of chances on the descent to open a gap of 20 seconds on the break.
Golas had three near-crashes on the very technical descent; the last saw him skidding to a stop in a driveway as he ran out of road. RadioShack’s Jan Bakelants did crash on the descent, but was able to recatch the breakaway.
The breakaway riders caught up to Golas on the final climb of the day, the Cat 3 Villa Tassani: 5 km long with an average grade of six percent and an eleven-percent section near the peak, this was a great springboard for attacks.
