Giro d'Italia

The Giro d’Italia, Tour of Italy or simply The Giro is one of the three Grand Tours that take place in Europe and which enjoy most popularity in the world of road cycling races. The Giro, as well as the Tour de France and La Vuelta a Espagna is a prestigious competition in which only the best professionals compete. It is commonly held on May or early June and it lasts three weeks. Most parts of the Giro take place in Italy but some stages may be held in other countries. As being one of the most important racing event in the world, the Giro is part of the UCI World Ranking calendar.

The race consists in day-long stages and the winner of each day is the rider who had finished the first, meaning the rider with the lowest time the winner of the overall tour is decided as the individual who has the lowest aggregate time from all the stages. The leader of the overall classification is awarded a pink jersey, while the leader of the Tour de France is awarded a yellow jersey. There is also a green jersey awarded to the rider who is the leader of the mountain classification and a mauve jersey to the one who leads in the points classification. Nevertheless, there is a best young rider classification which awards a white jersey. In the 1940s the last rider in the general classification would have gotten a black jersey. Italians have been winning most of the Giros and Felice Gimondi is the Italian who holds the record for most podium finishes. His portfolio includes three victories, two second places and four third places.

It was a tradition for the Giro to start and finish in Milan, the place where the headquarters of Gazzetta dello Sport were located. However, since 1960 the Giro starts in different places every year, and sometimes outside Italy. For a rather short period of time, the arrival location had also been changed but since the early 1990s, the final location had been restored to the traditional Milan with a circuit that would be repeated for few times and which would serve as the final parade. In 2009, the finish took place in Rome as a way to commemorate the centennial of the event and in 2010, the edition ended in Verona.

Although the tour takes places mostly in Italy, stages are included in other countries as well. For instance, the Giro had started or ended in countries such as San Marino, France, Monaco, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and Greece. This year, the Giro started in Turin with a 22 km time trial and will end in Milan on the 29tth of May with an individual time trial. Next year, the Giro will start in Denmark.