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Phil's Crazy and Grumpy Idea of the Month: Swap the Giro and Vuelta




With the Giro having such crap weather throughout I came to an idea...well...I read it in a comment through google translate on an Italian cycling forum...that maybe it would be wise to swap the Giro and Vuelta. Yes this throw's a wrench into tradition and history, I can see the passionate and tradition loving tifosi having more of an issue to this than the Spanish, but the hell with history. I care about seeing the best racing possible and having all 4 of the big Giro stages affected and altered by snow has made me grumpy as hell. I love the Giro more than any sporting event in the world and seeing it watered down like this is sad. So many legendary climbs in Italy would be more accessible in September than now. Now some climbs in Spain would also not be passable but usually the Vuelta takes in climbs that should be good to go in May. The Angliru, for instance, will see a sunny day of 64 F weather tomorrow. But the Vuelta is only taking in two days with climbs over 2000m anyway and usually stays quite a bit lower anyways(not a single climb over 2000m last year). The Gavia and Stelvio or Tre Cime or Galibier would not need to worry about snow in mid September(usually). The biggest complains about the Vuelta are the heat and dry surroundings of Spain in September, this could be eliminated in May. Italy is always beautiful and I'm sure less rain would be welcome. Now the Giro would need to adjust a bit to be better for Worlds warm ups(no 250km slogs) but boy do giro stages resemble worlds courses much more than Vuelta stages. So yes this year has been abnormal but this is hardly the first ever time a Giro climb has been cancelled and with climate changing rapidly this will always be a threat. I am ready for the Giro to be over by now because this is just frustrating. OK, there is my batshit crazy idea of the month!