James Shaw headed to the Giro d’Italia with a certain sense of history repeating itself this May, as for the second Grand Tour running, a late withdrawal from the start list by teammate and GC leader Richard Carapaz has forced EF Education-EasyPost to change their race strategies at the last minute.
Six days before the Vuelta a España last year, Carapaz was confirmed as a non-starter because of illness, and shortly before the Giro d’Italia this May, the lingering effects of an operation meant the former race winner would not be able to participate.
Cue one radical switch-around for the non-GC leaders like Shaw in EF Education, who, together with Markel Beloki and Madis Mihkels, was present in the Vuelta a España last year and who was brought to the Giro to work for Carapaz. However, with no Carapaz, the team has now switched to focus on breakaways.
“Even if you get in these breakaways, you’ve got guys that are trying to get themselves back up on GC, or guys like Jay Vine [in the Vuelta a España] who’ve written their GC off. So the quality of breaks is higher than it was even as little as four or five years ago.
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