Stage 1

The road

At the start

Turin, and a Giro with an asterisk

The Giro starts in Turin on the 150th anniversary of Italian unification with a 19.3-kilometre team time trial through the city. Alberto Contador is on the start list because his own federation cleared him in February; the UCI and WADA have appealed that to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and until it is heard he is free to race. Nineteen kilometres to see which teams can already take time out of the rest.

How it was won

1. 110 km to go

   Nine forty-eight at halfway

   HTC-Highroad come through the middle of the Turin circuit in 9:48, quickest of anyone, and then refuse to slow down for the second half.

2. 2At the line

   Five men, twenty-fifty-nine

   They arrive with only five riders left, which is exactly the number that counts, and the clock stops at 20:59. Marco Pinotti takes the first maglia rosa of the 2011 Giro, and the gaps between the overall contenders are small but they are no longer nothing.

The result