SIR BRADLEY WIGGINS' bid to follow up last year's Tour de France triumph with success in the Giro d'Italia should have been centre stage, but the spat over who will spearhead the Team Sky challenge for this year's Tour overshadowed it once more.
SIR BRADLEY WIGGINS' bid to follow up last year's Tour de France triumph with success in the Giro d'Italia should have been centre stage, but the spat over who will spearhead the Team Sky challenge for this year's Tour overshadowed it once more.
Sir Dave Brailsford, the team principal, fuelled matters by reiterating that Chris Froome will lead the charge at this year's Tour de France.
Froome played a vital role in helping Wiggins to win the 2012 Tour, finishing second overall himself, and Team Sky stated in January that the 2013 campaign would be built around Froome, with Wiggins in support.
Wiggins' main stated aim of 2013 then was victory in the Giro d'Italia, and Brailsford said the strategy set out at the start of the year remains in place. "As always, the team selection is a management decision and it will be evidence-based," he told the Team Sky website. "However it is crucial there is clarity of purpose and for that reason we will go to the Tour with one leader. Taking that into consideration and given Chris' step up in performances this year, our plan, as it has been since January, is to have him lead the Tour de France team."
Wiggins hinted at the end of April that he might be capable of challenging for a Giro and Tour double. Asked on April 29 if that was possible, he said: "As the years have gone on I've thought that maybe I'm capable of this now. Two years ago I never would have imagined trying to win the Giro because it was always about trying to win the Tour or trying to get on the podium at the Tour. It's just seeing what you're capable of doing with each year that goes past. It's an exploration of what you can do each year."
Michelle Cound, Froome's girlfriend, lost patience with the lack of clarity over the leadership situation and spoke out on April 30 via Twitter. She wrote: "To those claiming that this Wiggins/Froome thing is some sort of publicity stunt, you are wrong. I look forward to @TeamSky clearing up this mess (ASAP) £fedup."
Meanwhile, Katusha's Luca Paolini launched a late attack to win the third stage of the Giro d'Italia and take the leader's pink jersey. The Italian worked his way into a leading group containing a number of general classification contenders, including the defending champion Ryder Hesjedal, Wiggins, Vincenzo Nibali and Cadel Evans, during the closing stages.
Paolini made his move with six kilometres of the 222km run from Sorrento to Marina di Ascea remaining and opened up enough of a gap to win from of Evans and Hesjedal.
Wiggins was eighth and remains second in the general classification, 17 seconds down on Paolini. Wiggins' team-mate Rigoberto Uran is third overall, with the Astana rider Nibali fifth, 31 seconds behind Paolini. Garmin-Sharp's Hesjedal was three seconds further adrift.
Team Sky's Salvatore Puccio had held the pink jersey after Sunday's team time trial, but he fell away on the final climb before the finish and lost more than seven minutes. It was also a bad day for Lampre-Merida's Michele Scarponi, who fell on a damp patch of Tarmac on the descent towards the finish and lost a minute after waiting for a replacement bike.
The day's early breakaway had been made up of seven riders and Fabio Taborre (Vini Fantini-Selle Italia), Manuele Boaro (Saxo-Tinkoff), Willem Wauters (Vacansoleil-DCM), Jarlinson Pantano (Colombia), Dirk Bellemakers (Lotto Belisol), Jackson Rodriguez (Androni Giocattoli) and Bert De Backer (Argos-Shimano) led the peleton by over six minutes at one stage. But with Sky, Katusha and Omega Pharma-QuickStep taking turns at the front of the main field the gap was steadily eroded, with De Backer the first to struggle on the stage's first climb.
Taborre refused to accept the inevitable and broke away from the remaining quintet with around 55km to go in a solo bid for glory but he was overhauled when he cracked on the second of the day's two climbs as the likes of Wiggins, Nibali and Hesjedal formed a lead group clear of the peleton.
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