Stage 16

The road

How it was won

1. 173 km to go

   Hesjedal has had enough

   Coming through Aprica for the first time, with the break's lead crumbling, the 2012 winner simply rides away from his companions and builds two minutes of his own.

2. 267 km to go

   A mechanical in the wrong place

   On the twisting descent off the Aprica, while the cameras follow Diego Rosa's crash, the maglia rosa is in trouble with a bike problem as the peloton shatters into splinters. Katusha and Astana see it and press; by the foot of the Mortirolo Contador is chasing alone, nearly a minute down.

3. 334 km to go

   The Mortirolo

   Twelve kilometres averaging over ten per cent, and Contador spends most of them hopping from splinter group to splinter group. Then, around one of the hairpins, he sees Aru's back a few metres ahead — and the moment he arrives on the wheel, he attacks. Aru capitulates on the spot; Landa hesitates, is waved on, and leaves his own leader behind.

4. 425 km to go

   Pressing on the wet descent

   Contador does not sit up over the top. He drives the tree-lined plunge on a road that is drying but not yet dry, and behind him Aru's bike change turns a bad day into a hopeless one.

5. 54 km to go

   Kruijswijk, then Landa

   Four point three kilometres from Aprica, Steven Kruijswijk jumps. Landa closes him down and counter-attacks in the same movement, and neither of the others can go with him.

6. 6At the line

   Landa's second, Aru's collapse

   Landa wins in Aprica and rides into second overall. Kruijswijk beats Contador for the places; Fabio Aru arrives 2:49 behind his own domestique.

The result