The too hard basket

The Giro’s apparent modus operandi of making each year harder than the last may well be turning itself into a victim of its own undoing, writes Anthony Tan.

About a week-and-a-half ago on 21 April, Giro d'Italia organisers RCS sent out the provisional start list for the 94th edition of 'la corsa rosa'. Kick-off will be next Saturday 7 May in Turin, located in the country's northwest and Italy's first capital city in 1861, the century-and-a-half since unification being commemorated this year.

The 2011percorso is, once again, a veritable beast on paper. And for the television viewer, equivalent to a twelve-course degustation menu at Tetsuya's restaurant – only every night, and for three weeks straight.

In the current issue of Bicycling Australia, I summarised it thus: 'One team time trial; two individual time trials; one stupidly-long transfer that only lowly paid team deckhands and silly field reporters like yours truly have to concern themselves with; and four medium mountain stages and seven big mountain-top finishes (not including the Stage 16 mountain time trial) – spread across twenty-one stages and twenty-three days.'

It's an mouthful just reading it, let alone watching such a spectacle unfold, or for the riders, grinding their way through 3,496 race kilometres.

And perhaps over time, in RCS' predisposition to make each Giro more spectacular, more enthralling, more everything, they may be shooting themselves in the foot.

This year, apart from Alberto Contador, whose reasons for riding are obvious and are in some ways like Cadel Evans and BMC Racing last year, in that they weren't assured a start at the Tour de France, not one serious Tour contender has decided to make the pilgrimage to Italy.

No-one can deny last year's Giro being anything other than a showstopper. It was a one-in-every-twenty-years Grand Tour: the windswept legs in Holland that immediately created havoc; Evans' unforgettable stage win to Montalcino, raced in apocalyptic conditions; on another foul-weather day, the fifty-man break to the earthquake-strewn town of L'Aquila that saw Richie Porte in the maglia rosa; eventual winner Ivan Basso duelling with Evans on the mighty Zoncolan; and the individual time trial on the vertiginous slopes of the Plan de Corones.

Simultaneously, it's made bona fide Tour de France contenders shy away.

Basso, Evans, the Schleck brothers, Robert Gesink, Jurgen Van Den Broeck, Ryder Hesjedal, Christian Vande Velde and Bradley Wiggins Рall have steered away from the Italian Grand Tour this year. Instead, they've opted for the week-long and testing though far less arduous Tour of California, again running concurrently with the Giro from 15-22 May, or a recon mission in the French Alps and Pyren̩es, to familiarise themselves for what lies ahead this July.

And until sometime last week, when, more than a tad curiously, Porte found himself in the Saxo Bank line-up, it may also explain the smallest Australian presence at the Giro in almost ten years.

Mark Renshaw (HTC-High Road), Robbie McEwen (RadioShack), Cameron Meyer, Jack Bobridge and Matthew Wilson (Garmin-Cervélo) were our only five representatives, and if we consider the Antipodes, then we can include Julian Dean (also Garmin-Cervélo) to make six.

From 2010-2003, Aussie numbers at the Giro were: 14 riders – 6 – 9 – 8 – 9 – 12 – 8 – and 6. It was only in 2002 when representation dipped below a handful; Evans, McEwen, Graeme Brown and Mat Hayman were our awesome foursome. A year before there were just two: Nathan O'Neill and Tom Leaper.

Why not just ride two weeks of the Giro, I asked last year's revelation at the Tour Down Under, or do you feel the California-Tour de Suisse/Dauphiné route is a better way to prepare for the Tour?

"I guess you see guys like seasoned professionals who did the Giro as preparation for the Tour and it didn't really work for them," Porte told me. "So for a second-year professional, it's not really the smartest move. And I have to have faith in my team. I like my race program, and I think that's going to set me up pretty well to have a good Tour."

So California then Tour de Suisse or Cali and Criterium du Dauphiné?

"California then Tour de Suisse, at the moment. But I mean, we'll change the program if I am tired or whatever. It's pretty free and open to change," said Porte.

Change it did.

Sometime between RCS' 21 April press release and the end of the Tour of Romandie, Saxo Bank chief Bjarne Riis made two subtle changes to their Giro line-up, substituting Gustav Larsson and Benjamin Noval with Porte and Michael Mørkøv. So that makes six Aussies; nothing compared to the fourteen of 2010, but better than five.

But why did Riis do this? Is he sending what looks like their Tour de France team to the Giro for a dress rehearsal? Or, in the back of his mind, does he think Contador has a good chance of being suspended by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, who has assured the public a decision on the Spaniard's fate will be made by the end of June, and is thus treating the Giro as if it were the Tour?

"We have a strong line-up but we also know that we will find very strong rivals on the start line whose indisputable objective is to achieve the overall victory of the Giro," said Contador in a team press release dated 30 April. "However, I'm confident we will do a good job and we will be fighting for the win."

Either way, for Riis to include Porte at the Giro and not save him for the Tour – just as the rest of the TdF contenders are saving themselves – it seems the Scandinavian feels Porte does not yet hold the capacity to lead Saxo Bank to a high finish at the Tour. Given the team's enviable track record, Riis would be aiming for the podium at the very least in July.

And if that is his belief, I tend to agree with him.

While this year's Giro is not devoid of marquee names – apart from Contador, Stefano Garzelli (Acqua e Sapone), Denis Menchov (Geox-TMC), Mark Cavendish (HTC-Highroad), Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) and Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas-Cannondale) are but a few – other riders like Evans and Vinokourov, simply by their presence, race panache and non-European background, make the race special.

For the Giro not to become a victim of its own doing and be trumped by a star-studded Tour of California, maybe it's time for a rethink.

Follow Anthony on Twitter: @anthony_tan