No such thing as fleeting visit for Giro

Long transfers from stages at Grand Tours are nothing strange in the world of cycling but Sunday’s mammoth journey from Dublin to Bari was one of the longest — and logistically difficult — in the race’s recent history.

A distance of 2,756 kilometres separates the cities and while Team Sky’s Philip Deignan sprinted down Merrion Street in the Irish capital on Sunday afternoon at around 4pm in front of 50,000 rain-soaked fans, 24 hours later, on Monday’s rest day, he was out for a leisurely spin in Bari in the south-east corner of Italy.

Deignan said the transfer was six months in planning, and part and parcel of elite cycling.

“The transfer went pretty smoothly really,” said the Letterkenny man. “When we got to the airport in Dublin on Monday morning, our boarding passes were all waiting for us and we walked straight through.

“We flew on a Thomas Cook-chartered plane and when we landed in Bari, the organisers had pulled out all the stops to make the journey as stress-free as possible, with the team buses even parked on the runway.

“After a quick passport check, my Sky squad only had a five-minute drive to our hotel, arriving about 1pm, just in time for lunch so it was a pretty quick and efficient transfer.”

The Giro organisers (RCS) chartered three planes to make it all seamless; two for team staff, riders, officials and organising staff, plus a third for cargo.

The cargo flight left at 8pm on Sunday night and was unloaded at 5am Monday morning in Italy. The riders made the three-hour flight on Monday morning, leaving Dublin at 8am.

RCS, who also needed a convoy of vehicles (for officials, staff, etc.), brought very few of their own to Ireland but instead, partnered with local car dealer ‘Donnelly’ who supplied them with a full convoy of cars. Fifty police motorbikes and several police cars were also at RCS’s disposal.

Race staff comprised of nearly 600 members while in Ireland but over double that was needed when the race returned to Italy. Broken down, it works out to a total of 25,000 nights’ worth of hotel reservations, spread over 800 hotels throughout the three weeks.

Each of the 22 teams in the race brought a team bus and at least two team cars to Ireland from their respective bases in Italy, Spain, France and Holland, amongst others, for the three days.

Into the buses were packed two bikes per rider for the majority of the teams, their equipment, clothes, nutrition, helmets, bottles, energy bars and everything else needed for the short stint in Ireland.

One of the other headaches for RCS is getting suitable hotels and, in advance of the tour, organisers made numerous visits to Ireland.

An interesting note is that each team brought their own chef and they issued each hotel with a shopping list in advance of their arrival — tailored to each rider’s nutritional requirements. The team chef then takes over with the help of local hotel staff. Day after day, for 21 days.