What's Italian for deja vu?
Once again, Alessandro Petacchi's team led the sprinter into the last mile of Wednesday's stage, only to see him taken at the finish line by Australian Robbie McEwen.
It's the third stage win by sprinter McEwen, riding for Davitaman-Lotto. This time he jumped with Pettachi about 200 yards out and won by the width of a tire, according to live race reports from CyclingNews.
Petacchi, known as the Ale-Jet, has one just one stage so far this year (Sunday), compared to nine last year. With the mountain stages starting on Thursday, it might be a while before we hear from Fassa Bortolo's team leader again.
The peloton covered the pizza-flat 131-mile stage between Ravenna and Rossano Venetoi in about 5 hours and 30 minutes. Other top finishers included Stuard O'Grady (3, Cofidis), Erik Zabel (4, T-Mobile) and Paolo Bettini (5, Quick.Step).
The mass finish Wednesday means the overall standings remain essentially unchanged. Danilo Di Luca of Liquigas-Bianchi retains the leader's pink jersey for the fifth day. Team CSC's favorite, Ivan Basso, trails by just 9 seconds, and Discovery Channel Pro Cycling team's Paolo Salvodelli (the winner in 2002) follows in third by 35 seconds.
The look of the race changes Thursday, as the peloton enters the Dolomites and a stage finish at the ski resort Dolomiti Stars. Live reports are available on CyclingNews and VeloNews and the OLNTV website provides a webcast of the live video feed.
If you're interested in checking out the live feed from OLN, pay a visit first to the What I Think blog. There's a review of the webcast service at “OLN's Got a Brand New Bag.”
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