200km of escape, a great final and a third place that rewards the great work of the day. Too bad for the win, but “Gnula” is already in the history of his city.
Tenth stage of Giro d’Italia, from Civitanova Marche to Forlì, the city where Alessandro Malaguti was born and raised. For this reason he wanted to be protagonist.
The streets of home and his fans supported his attempt: only a few chilometres after the start Malaguti tried the escape together with Gatto (Androni), Busato (Southeast), Boem (Bardiani-CSF) and Marangoni (Cannondale). They stayed in front of the group for 200km and suceeded in arriving at the finish line.
The third position has a bittersweet taste, because Malaguti was really close to the victory and an occasion such this, in his town, was unique.
However, a podium in Giro d’Italia has an enormous value for an athlete ready to work every day for the leader of his team: "A great escape: when I realized that we could arrive at the finish line, I had the thrills. This was the dream of a life that was about to realized, for this after the finish line I shed tears. However I conquered a graet third place in Giro d’Italia in my town and this is something special": with these words Malaguti tells his race and his emotions at the end of a day in which he was the first athlete to make breakfast, the first at the start line and the one that decided to try to escape.
Stefano Giuliani makes his congratulattions to Malaguti: "He made a great performance; in few believed that the escape could arrive at the finish line. What a pity for the losed opportynity, everyone likes to win, even us, but we are happy. A lot of people told us that our team is the one with the highest rate of enthusiasm in the World and this enthusiasm give us the strenght to try this actions".
Now the #OrangeBlue will make a toast in half for the first podium in this Giro but the head – and the egs – are already at the eleventh stage, Forlì – Imola. 147 nervous and insidious chilometres.