SAPPADA: Britain’s Simon Yates tightened his grip on the overall lead at the Giro d’Italia on Sunday after storming to victory in Stage 15 with a strong solo effort.

Mitchelton-Scott’s Yates attacked 17km from the finish line to leave his rivals in the dust and claim his third stage win on the 176km route through the Dolomites from Tolmezzo to Sappada. The grueling leg saw riders almost continuously climbing and descending.

“It was really hard from the bottom of the climb. I still felt good so I chose my moment to go,” said Yates, who was struggling to hold back tears. “They responded the first time but then I tried again and I gave it everything to get away. It’s fantastic. I don’t know why I’m a bit emotional after today. I gave everything.”

The 25-year-old from Bury started the day with a one minute and 24 second lead over Dutch rider and defending champion Tom Dumoulin, who battled hard to finish third behind Colombian Miguel Angel Lopez of the Astana Pro Team, 41 seconds off the pace.

The win means Yates extended his lead over Dumoulin to two minutes and 11 seconds with one week to go.

Team Sky’s Chris Froome, who won Saturday’s stage on Monte Zoncolan, finished 17th, one minute and 32 seconds behind his fellow Briton and dropped two places to seventh in the overall standings, four minutes and 52 seconds behind Yates.

Italy’s Domenico Pozzovivo of Bahrain finished fourth and is third overall 2min 28sec behind Yates with France’s Thibaut Pinot of Groupama fourth overall at 2min 37sec.

Monday’s final rest day will be followed by a time-trial at Rovereto on Tuesday where Team Sunweb’s Dumoulin is expected to gain time.

“He can take two minutes out of me on the TT, on one stage. So it’s not over,” Yates said. “But I’m happy with what I did today.”

However, Dumoulin believes Yates is in such good form that he is favourite to clinch overall victory when the Giro ends in Rome on May 27.

“He’s in such great shape that maybe he can also do a really good time trial. We’ll just have to see,” Dumoulin said. “Even if I have an excellent TT and he doesn’t and I take the lead, it’s still going to be very difficult. He’s riding away from us whenever he wants.”

Published in Dawn, May 21st, 2018