Lightning, rain, hail - weather protocol enforced in cancelled Giro Donne opener

The opening time trial was cancelled due to a heavy downpour that forced the CPA Women and the race jury to apply the Extreme Weather Protocol at the Giro d'Italia Donne on Friday.

The organisers prioritised the safety of the peloton in the cancellation of stage 1 due to bad weather, which also means that there will be no maglia rosa awarded in  Chianciano.

"Due to weather conditions, we decided to apply the Extreme Weather Protocol and the stage is cancelled. See you tomorrow," said CPA Women manager Alessandra Cappellotto. Cappellotto is the CPA Women delegate and Extreme Weather Protocol and rider representative at the Giro d'Italia Donne, taking place from June 30 to July 9.

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The race organisation later published a statement which further explained that the severe thunderstorms had caused roadways to become blocked with standing water and debries.

"Due to the storm with hail, flashes and impassable roads (water, mud and stones), the 1st stage of Giro Donne has been initially interrupted and later cancelled. The decision was take jointly by the director of the organization, the Commisaries’ Panel, the CPA and the representative of the teams (Team Jayco AlUla)," read the statement.

There were 167 riders across 24 teams preparing to start the opening stage at the Giro d'Italia Donne, which was a 4.4km time trial in Chianciano.

Under dark skies and rainfall, the first riders began their individual efforts. However, as the event progressed, the bad weather worsened with heavy rainfall, lightning and hail that quickly escalated to slippery road surfaces, low visibility and potentially dangerous standing water on sections of the route.

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The race jury initially suspended the stage after roughly 25 riders had completed their time trials. Several of those riders had crashed, including overwhelming favourites US champion Chloé Dygert (Canyon-SRAM), defending overall winner Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar) and last year's podium finisher Mavi Garcia (Liv Racing TeqFind).

"Race currently stopped (it wasn't stopped whilst this hail and ear-shattering thunder and lightning was going! But now it's 'dried up' a bit and restart at 13.30)," Lizzy Banks of the EF Education-TIBCO-SVB team wrote in a post on social media.

Team Jayco AlUla also posted a video to the team social media channel that showed footage of the large sections of standing what that they were forced to drive through as they followed their rider on course.

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The race was initially suspended for 23 minutes due to the rainfall, hail and thunder. At that time, and despite the crash, Dygert had set the fastest time of 5:43.61 before being beaten by Van Vleuten with 5:42.80, 81 hundredths of a second faster.

When the racing resumed, and 83 riders had started the their time trial before the Extreme Weather Protocol was enforced by the race jury and the race was cancelled. At that time Letizia Paternoster (Team Jayco AlUla) held the fastest time of 5:41.99, Van Vleuten in second and Marianne Vos (Jumbo-Visma) in third at 5:42.80.

"The race has been suspended. No race today because of the weather," was the first official statement from the race jury after they had taken time to deliberate on the weather conditions and how it affected the riders safety.

Due to the stage cancellation there was no podium ceremony or special jerseys, including the overall leader's maglia rosa, awarded.

"I gave it everything in the ride, but it's the best possible choice to suspend this stage. Safety first!," said Vos, who had posted the third fastest time, behind Paternoster and Van Vleuten at the time the stage was official cancelled.

The official stage race will instead begin on stage 2 from Bagno a Ripoli to Marradi on Saturday.

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