Domenico Pozzovivo con­firmed he is one of the best pure climbers in pro­fes­sional cycling by con­quer­ing the ter­ri­ble Punta Veleno climb at the Giro del Trentino, win­ning the stage and tak­ing the over­all race lead.

Pozzovivo dis­tanced all his rivals on the painfully steep slopes of the Punta Veleno climb. He spun a small gear on his Colnago C59 Italia bike and con­tin­ued to gain time all the way to the fin­ish.  He fin­ished 23 ahead of Sylvester Szmyd and 1:12 ahead of Damiano Cunego. Pozzovivo now leads over­all, ahead of Cunego by 25 seconds.

It was a classy per­for­mance by the diminu­tive Italian climber as the Giro d’Italia approaches. Pozzovivo pulled on the leader’s ciclamino coloured jer­sey and also took con­trol of the climber’s green jersey.

“It’s an incred­i­ble climb. Fortunately it went well for me. I’m really happy,” Pozzovivo gasped just sec­onds after reach­ing the finish. “I man­aged to stay calm and in con­trol. The team con­trolled the race early on and then I attacked when I wanted to and I quickly got a gap. The climb was so hard that I had to use 34x29 and I only changed to 34x27 near the top.”

He and his Colnago CSF Inox team­mates now have to defend the race lead dur­ing Friday’s final stage to the sum­mit of the Passo Pordoi. Ideal ter­rain for such a strong pure climber as Pozzovivo.

“I hope to do well on the Pordoi. It’s not a dif­fi­cult climb and so the team will be impor­tant, espe­cially on the flat roads before the climb. There will be attacks but I’m on form and ready for a fight.”

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