[greglepore]

Originally Posted by jyl

Tirreno-Adriatico 2013 Stage 6, yesterday. Well worth going to YouTube and watching the 1h30m video of the last 50k, posted by one Tom Campbell. There is a climb, not short, into and through a coastal Italian hill town, that starts hard and gets worse and worse, reaching a 27% grade, bad road surface, raining, at the tail end of a wet cold 250k stage the racers were sent up this climb three times. A third of the peloton abandoned. The best climbers in the world, riding special 36 x 28 gearing, were laboring up, zigzagging, getting off and walking. Cavendish abandoned before the first time up. Cancellara cracked. Fromme cracked. Contador almost cracked. Nibali and Sagan and Rodriguez took half a minute out of the next group. Awesome sufferfest. The race organizer apologized afterwards.

And Taylor Phinney, off the back, rode thinking the whole way of his dad, who has Parkinsons. Finished, but beyond the cutoff, and went and had a good cry.