Pedersen sprints back into Giro pink after mountain goat incident
This was a second stage win on the 2025 Giro following the Lidl-Trek rider's opening day win and left him 9sec clear of Slovenian veteran Primoz Roglic in the overall standings.
Despite a 10.7km climb with seven percent gradients 35km from the finish, an arrow-straight 1km home run on the Adriatic coast set up a very high speed finish where Pedersen went early and held off a late burst from Corbin Strong of IPT.
"That's exactly what we wanted today. We have two victories already and the pink jersey," said a clearly ecstatic Pedersen, who finished in 3hr 49min 47sec.
Halfway through the race, a mountain goat hit straggling rider Dion Smith of Intermarche-Wanty in the hills outside Vlore.
Fortunately neither rider nor goat were hurt as a herd of goats and a large unaccompanied dog watched on, with Smith showing great reactions in staying upright as the goat ran across the road right into him.
Many of the pure sprinters were dropped 60km from the finish while Saturday's time trial winner Josh Tarling led a 120km break on Sunday, but was caught and dropped by the peloton on the last climb.
Roglic remains the highest placed of the favourites for the overall title with Team UAE rider Juan Ayuso 16sec behind him as the 22-year-old Spaniard attempts to defend the title his team won with Tadej Pogacar in 2024.
Italian home hope Antonio Tiberi, Simon Yates of Visma, his twin brother Adam Yates of UAE and two former South American winners of the Giro, Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz and Colombian Egan Bernal, are all well positioned 25-50sec adrift.
Those kind of gaps can go up in smoke over the space of a kilometre in the high mountains during the final week.
After three days in Albania, the Giro heads back across the Adriatic to Italy, with Monday a rest day for the riders.
Tuesday's fourth stage is a flat run to Lecce in the heel of Italy, where the pure sprinters such as Olav Kooij, Sam Bennett, Kaden Groves or Paul Magnier should be in the final mix.
The rest of next week is hills galore as the riders criss-cross Italy via Matera and Napoli and climbing as far as Siena by stage nine.
The final week of the Giro will be decisive with stage 16 featuring five Alpine mountains, and stage 20 ending with a gruelling climb up the Colle delle Finestre to the Sestriere ski resort -- the moment when the winner is likely to emerge.
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