Not Just Remco And Roglič: Here's Who to Watch in the 2023 Giro
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The 106th edition of the Giro d’Italia kicks off on Saturday with an 18.4K individual time trial. 20 stages, nearly 3,400 kilometers, and 22 days later, we’ll watch the racers trace a white-hot circuit around Rome before someone climbs to the top of the podium in the maglia rosa.
So much will happen between then and now. Storylines will emerge, rivalries will be born, legends may even be made.
Perhaps it’ll shake out exactly as we think it will, with Remco, Primož, and Geraint Thomas battling it out for the maglia rosa.
Maybe we’ll see something (or someone) else entirely. With reigning champ Jai Hindley skipping in order to focus on Le Tour, it’s a wide-open tilt.
No matter what, it’s almost officially Grand Tour season and we could not be more excited, especially considering the madcap spring season we just witnessed.
On the eve of the season’s first men’s Grand Tour, here are the riders we’re going to be paying close attention to throughout La Corsa Rosa.
The Favorites
Soudal Quick-Step’s Remco Evenepoel is coming into the Giro as one of the race’s heavy favorites. He dominated 2022’s Vuelta, spending 16 days in the red jersey, and he was on spectacular form as he soloed to victory at Liége-Bastonge-Liége (which, like this Giro, was billed for months as a head-to-head with another superstar—Tadej Pogačar—who crashed out of LBL early in the day).
Evenepoel had an inauspicious Giro debut, abandoning his first go at the race in 2021. After skipping last year, the young Belgian superstar is back and he’s armed with great form, loads more racing knowhow, and that Grand Tour victory on his palmarès.
Of course, many pundits have claimed that Evenepoel’s victory at last year’s Vuelta may have been different if his biggest challenger, Primož Roglič, hadn’t crashed out. Here’s hoping both racers can stay in one piece and we get the finish we’ve been hoping for all year.
Primož Roglič
The Slovenian star has only started two races this year: Tirreno-Adriatico and Catalunya. He won both, sweeping all three jerseys in former and winning the GC and points jersey in the latter. Oh, and he finished second in the mountains classification at Catalunya.
The one thing that may set Roglič apart from the other GC contenders is the support of his Jumbo-Visma team, who spent much of the spring dominating everything in sight.
Of course, visions of the 2019 Giro come to mind, when Roglič spent two weeks dominating the race before he let Richard Carapaz sneak away to victory.
Geraint Thomas
Against 23-year-old Evenepoel and 33-year-old Roglič, Geraint Thomas, 36, is the graybeard amongst this year’s favorites. He turns 37 just a week after stage 13, which many experts are eyeing as the stage that could win or lose the Giro.
Regardless of age, Thomas has shown great form of late. After finishing third at last year’s Tour de France and winning the Tour de Suisse, the Welsh veteran once again established himself as a perpetual threat to the GC.
The Ineos Grenadier had a relatively quiet spring however, finishing the Tour of the Alps, Catalunya, and Santos Tour Down Under. But expect to see him fighting at the front of the GC competition early and often over the next three weeks.
They Won’t Win It All but They’ll Win Something
Mark Cavendish
You can never count the Manx Missile out when a sprint finish is in the offing. And with three fully flat stages and a handful of hilly days, Mark Cavendish has a puncher’s chance to take a stage win here or there.
Just a few days after abandoning the Tour de Romandie due to illness, Cav’s Astana Qazaqstan team announced that he’ll be at the start of the Giro. Though he’ll be without the team’s steadfast leadout man, Cees Bol, who will be preparing for Le Tour, where Cav will be attempting to win his thirty-fifth stage, breaking the deadlock with Eddy Merckx for most ever.
Tao Geoghegan Hart
The only racer on this list with a Giro victory to his name, Tao Geoghegan Hart has never quite lived up to the high of his 2020 win. Thanks to his recent victory at the Tour of the Alps though, some still have him pegged as a GC contender. But it’ll be hard racing alongside Inoes Grendaiers teammate Geraint Thomas.
Expect to see him at the very least contest for a hilly-stage win or two somewhere along the line. Beyond that? Maybe.
The Wildcards
Thibaut Pinot
The ever-mercurial Thibaut Pinot is entering his final Grand Tour season. The 32-year-old Frenchman announced earlier this year that this would be his last season in the saddle.
Riding for Groupama-FDJ, Pinot is still an elite climber so, considering the 51,300 meters of vertical the peloton is facing, don’t be surprised if we see him do the most Thibaut Pinot thing ever and eke out a couple of stage wins or somehow sneak his way onto the podium.
Ben Healy
Beyond Evenepoel and Tadej Pogačar, the biggest story of this year’s spring had to have been Ben Healy. The 22-year-old Irishman more than made his mark during the Ardennes classics, finishing second at Amstel Gold Race, fourth at Liège-Bastonge-Liège, and second at De Brabantse Pijl.
He displayed a fearlessness in his long-distance attacks that enamored many race fans and cycling experts alike. Maybe one of those attacks will stick and the EF Education-EasyPost racer will head home a Giro d’Italia stage winner.
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