Battaglin wins fifth stage as Dennis maintains overall lead

SANTA NINFA: Enrico Battaglin (pic) surged ahead at the perfect moment to win the fifth stage of the Giro d’Italia as Chris Froome and most of the other favourites finished in the main pack.

Rohan Dennis held onto the overall leader’s pink jersey with a one-second lead over defending champion Tom Dumoulin, with fourtime Tour de France winner Froome 55 seconds back in 19th place.

Giovanni Visconti, a Sicilian looking to impress before his home fans, led coming around the final turn with 200m to go before Battaglin accelerated to take his third career Giro victory.

Battaglin, who rides for Team LottoNL-Jumbo, finished third in a slightly tougher stage on Tuesday.

“The finish was a bit different to yesterday. Yesterday was really a powerful sprint on a really steep climb,” said Battaglin, who also won Giro stages in 2013 and 2014.

“Today was a steep climb but at 2km to go and I had a little bit of time to rest and recover and do a really good sprint.”

Visconti crossed second and Jose Goncalves of Portugal finished second, both with the same time as Battaglin.

Battaglin clocked slightly more than four hours over the 153km leg from Agrigento to Santa Ninfa in southwestern Sicily.

The start of the stage was delayed for 15 minutes due to an accident on the racing route that left a motorcycle rider in serious condition.

Simon Yates, the Briton who won the young rider classification at last year’s Tour de France, sits third overall – 17 seconds behind Dennis, who claimed the lead after the second stage.

“It was a nice day on the bike, on quite a slow pace because of the head wind,” said Dennis, an Australian with BMC.

“I felt a bit of stress every now and then but I am glad to be in the Maglia Rosa.

“We’re only on day five, that means sixteen days to go. Tomorrow will be another story with the Etna.

“I’m looking forward to see how I’ll go up there.” —AP