Nairo Quintana is set to lead the Movistar team at the Giro d'Italia, and the diminutive Colombian super-climber is certain to be amongst the favourites to claim overall victory. Although he was already well known as a talented rider with a huge future, Quintana really established himself as a star with his 2nd place finish in the 2013 Tour de France. A performance that included a stage win on Le Semnoz, winning the White Jersey as the best young rider in the race, and most important of all for a Colombian, winning the King of the Mountain's Jersey.
Quintana was in excellent form at the start of 2014, winning two stages and the overall at the Tour de San Luis in Argentina in January. After that he returned to Colombia for the birth of his first child and returned to racing in March, but hasn't quite hit his best form since that break. Quintana finished 2nd overall in Tirreno-Adriatico, but had been unable to follow Alberto Contador's crucial attack; next came a 5th place finish in a weather affected Volta a Catalunya, before another short break to prepare for the Giro.
There has been a fair amount of grumbling over the team's decision to send Quintana to the Giro d'Italia rather than the Tour de France. The Tour remains the sports marquee event and many want to see all the big names riders there to contest the race. However there are strong arguments in favour of Quintana riding the Giro this year instead of the Tour.
Firstly the Italian race's parcours suits him better. The Tour de France does have some exciting looking mountain stages but the Giro has more of them and also possesses the most difficult climb in either race, the fearsome Monte Zoncolan. At 10.1km, with an 11% gradient and ramps of up to 22%, the Zoncolan is one of the most formidable ascents ever faced by the professional peloton; it is also a climb which favours the slighter build of a pure climber such as Quintana.
Secondly riding the Giro as the designated leader will enable Quintana to experience approaching a Grand Tour as the designated team leader and race favourite, while racing in a less pressured environment than the Tour de France. He is still young and learning how to be a Grand Tour rider, let him develop a little more before expecting him to really challenge for the Tour de France. As Movistar Team general manager Eusebio Unzué told the team website "I prefer to keep him growing into the formation period he's still in and let him know the Giro, because we think it's an extremely interesting race for him to progress on so many aspects, and where he will enjoy full leadership in a Grand Tour for the first time."
Lastly not everything in cycling has to revolve around the Tour, it is a great race but so is the Giro, winning either remains a career defining event. I know if I were a top level GC rider I'd want to have victories in both in my palmares if at all possible.
A terrific climber and attacking rider, Quintana has little to fear from the Giro's mountainous terrain, however there remain potential obstacles in his path. Quintana's status as a favourite will put pressure on the team to dictate much of the racing, but whichever combination of riders make the final nine man squad, Movistar are sending a strong team with riders who can support Quintana on all-terrain. There are also three time trials in the race.
The opening stage Team Time Trial in Belfast is fairly flat but Movistar will have a strong unit led by Adriano Malori, Andrey Amador and/or Jonathan Castroviejo for the race, which should ensure Quintana loses little time to any major rivals. The long individual time-trial into Barolo on stage twelve was billed as the flat ITT, but this being the Giro, flat does not really mean flat, it just means there are no major mountain passes on the route, there are two hills instead. The third time trial comes on stage 19 and is an individual mountain effort which suits Quintana perfectly. Quintana is actually a fairly good time trialist, but on the flatter parcours smaller and slighter riders are always going to be at a disadvantage, so it was good for Quintana that the "flat" ITT isn't really flat.